Report: Government of India set to launch fitness application soon

Sports secretary Ravi Mittal spoke about the application at the launch of Airtel Delhi Half Marathon.

The secretary of the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports, Ravi Mittal, revealed that the Government of India is looking to launch an application to assist people of the country to keep a check and improve their health and fitness level. The release is estimated to be in January 2021.

Ravi Mittal shared the insights of this project during the Airtel Delhi Half Marathon press conference. “We are developing a fit India app next year, It will be like other health app but the main thing will be that everyone will be able to evaluate their fitness,” he said as reported by PTI.

“We will be launching this app sometime in January. I would like to request all the participants in the event to come to this application and check their fitness. If you check your fitness every month, it will improve your fitness.”

Staging an event like Airtel Delhi Half Marathon during this grave COVID-19 pandemic in the country is a challenge of its own. To counter that, the organizers have decided that international and domestic elite runners would start the event at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium while amateurs from all over the world would then join them via the exclusive Airtel Delhi Half Marathon Mobile App. Among the runners present at the stadium will be defending champions Ethiopia’s Andamlak Belihu and Tsehay Gemechu.

Ravi Mittal further added, "Events like this will help us to understand that things are slowly getting normal, if we have to win medals in Olympics, we have to change ourselves, how long can we stop ourselves for COVID. So these events will help in strengthening our mind. I would like to request procam to organise more such marathons before the Olympics, so we can strengthen he mind. We can sponsor them if necessary, fund will not be a problem.”

Adille Sumariwalla, the president of the Athletics Federation of India said, "This is the first event happening in India, we have been under shutdown. The athletes are rearing to go, for the athletes they can’t just be training, they have to compete. So it will be a starting point.”

“From April onwards there was a blackout period, that gets over now. This is the resurgence of athletes, resurgence of sports, there are some top class runners who are coming, as sports person, we like to take on the challenge, we will compete, and come on top.”

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