STATE TIMES NEWS
JAMMU: FICCI FLO JKL Chapter organized the Marathon’24 Run4Health in collaboration with the University of Jammu and SMVD Narayana Hospital as health partner, powered by Munjal Auto in the City of Temples on Sunday.
Over 850 runners from all walks of life participated in the half-marathon, with an aim to raise funds for TB eradication in line with the PM’s call for “TB Mukt Bharat”.
In terms of the number of participants, Run4Health became the most successful marathon in Jammu, eliciting a huge response from serious runners to those participating for promoting a healthy lifestyle.
The District Administration also used the event to create voter awareness under the SVEEP initiative.
The Chief Guest on the occasion was Prof. Umesh Rai, Vice Chancellor, University of Jammu who flagged the event early morning from the University campus.
He appreciated the efforts of the FICCI FLO JKL Team for taking the initiative promoting healt3hy lifestyle and fundraising for the TB patients.
Divisional Commissioner Jammu, Ramesh Kumar, was the Chief Guest at the valedictory function and presented the medals to the winners including all-terrain bicycles sponsored by Munjal Auto.
He lauded the participants for turning up in large numbers to support a noble cause.
He also felicitated the large number of sponsors for the event. Ansuya Jamwal, Additional DM, Jammu urged the participants to exercise their fundamental right to vote and highlighted the SVEEP initiative to energize the voters in the region.
Other dignitaries who graced the event included Shishir Gupta, Additional DM, Jammu, Ajay Sharma, SP South, Jammu, Ayaz Natnoo, Deputy Director, Horticulture, Dr. Daud Iqbal Baba, Director Department of Physical Education, JU, M.M Mathavan, Facility Director, SMVD Narayana Hospital and Dr. J.P Singh, Neurologist, SMVD Narayana Hospital.
Ruchika Gupta, Chairperson, FICCI FLO JKL welcomed the dignitaries and outlined the motive behind organizing the marathon which received great support from the people of Jammu city.
She declared that the proceeds from the marathon shall be donated for the welfare of TB patients, for their medication and nutrition needs.
She expressed gratitude to the dignitaries for their immense support in helping organize a successful event, including the dedicated team of FICCI FLO and a large number of volunteers.
All participants of the marathon received “Goody Bags” containing gifts, which were appreciated by them. Fruit packs for the runners were sponsored by the Department of Horticulture.
The organizing Committee of the Run4Health marathon included Varuna Anand, Immediate Past Chairperson, FICCI FLO JKL, Arti Chowdhary, Senior Vice Chairperson, Varsha Bansal, Vice Chairperson, Sona Mehta, Treasurer, Pooja Gandotra, Joint Treasurer, Mona Saraf, Secretary, Nandita Bajaj, Joint Secretary, Kanupriya Garg, Executive Committee Member and Shipra Aggarwal, Member.
The Iron Ambassadors for the marathon included Archit Puri and Aman Gupta. The Inspiration for All Ambassadors included Kanupriya Garg and Kritika Khanna. There were a total of 13 ambassadors, 10 pacers & 3 marshals for the marathon.
Each participant received a bib which had an embedded timing chip providing detailed analytics on the performance of each runner.
Prior to the flag-off, a Zumba warm-up was organized at 4:30 am by the fitness partner CultFit and the event was anchored by entertainment partner Radio Mirchi.
In the 21 Km half-marathon, overall winners were Ravi Dass and Rimpi Devi, winners in the Under 40 years category were Irfan Hafiz, Sukaran Raj Sharma and Sagar Suman among the males and Mamta Sharma, Palak Malih and Poonam Agarwal among the females. In the above 40 years category, Ram Raj, Ravinder Sharma and Dinesh Gupta bagged the first three positions respectively while in the female category Dr. Prateeksha Raghuvanshi emerged as the sole winner. In the 10 km marathon, Ritik Sharma, Sakshi Thakur emerged as overall winners in the male and female category respectively. Winners in the Under 40 years category were Anil Mehra, Manmeet Singh Atal and Sunit Kumar among males and Sonia Sharma, Madhu Sharma, Shreeja Slathia in the females. In the above 40 years category Mangat Singh, Hemant Kumar Saini and Amit Yadav bagged the first three positions, while among the females, Neeti Dutt, Shalini Gupta and Sneha Saini finished in the top 3 respectively. In the 5 Km run, overall winners were Gurcharan Singh and Shamshad Bano. Winners in the Under 40 years category were Brij Bhushan, Hans Raj and Ajay Kumar among the males, while Anjali Rajpput, Sunakshi Thakur and Rachna Sharma emerged the winners among the females. In the above 40 years category, Makhan Lal, Kapil Arora and Abhishek Sharma finished in the top 3, while Anju Sharma, Enakshi Gupta and Sunita Bharti were the podium finishers among the females.