Mangalore, January 16: Senior government officers vested with the responsibility of overseeing the 17th National Youth Festival, had to face the ire of city journalists at a press conference called at TMA Pai International Convention Centre a few hours ahead of the valedictory ceremony of the event on Monday in an apparent bid to appease the latter.
The journalists also refused to accept the gifts presented to them at the press conferences in which Deputy Commissioner N S Channappa Gowda and DK Zilla Panchayat CEO K N Vijayaprakash were also present.
When the Principal Secretary of Youth Services and Sports I R Perumal was about the wind up the press conference after thanking the media persons for wide coverage of the event and asking them to accept a 'memento', the scribes took him to task and demanded explanation from the officials about how much money they had spent and swallowed in the pretext of arranging 'memento' for the media persons.
A few journalists, who were disappointed with the indifferent treatment during the course of five day-long event accused the officers of irresponsibility and misappropriation.
They also held Department of Youth Services and Sports and the Dakshina Kannada district administration responsible for the alleged favoritism and nepotism in issuing VIP passes for the Festival, as the family members and children of few officers too had bagged VIP passes.
Lack of arrangements for media persons in some places, especially in TMA Pai International Convention Centre, where a few journalists had to sit on the floor while covering the cultural programmes, and restrictions put on photographers and cameramen in many events, were reasons for the further disappointment of the journalists.
Mr Perumal had to apologize the media persons for all the inconvenience caused to them.
Earlier at the press conference Mr Perumal said that the initiative to host this year's Youth Festival in Karnataka was taken by former Youth Services and Sports Minister Gullihatti Shekar after witnessing the 15th edition of the Festival held in Bhubaneswar the capital city of the state of Odisha.
Mr Perumal revealed that Mr Shekar had taken a team of around 170 members Bhubaneswar and sought to organise the festival in Karnataka. This was followed up by Karnataka officials at a meeting held in New Delhi a few weeks after the Minister's visit. It was in May 2011 that the Centre informed the State about hosting the 17th edition of the festival in Bangalore.
However, finally the city of Mangalore was chosen to host the event owing to climate, finance, and other factors, he said.
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