The government has changed the names of the ‘Bangabandhu Gold Cup Primary School Football Tournament’ and ‘Bangamata Sheikh Fazilatunnesa Mujib Gold Cup Primary School Football Tournament’ organized for students of the government primary schools for the last few years.
The tournaments have been renamed as ‘Primary School Gold Cup Football Tournament (Boys and Girls).’
The Directorate of Primary Education informed field-level officials and educational institutions about the change of the tournament name on Tuesday.
“This is a policy decision. The ministry decided to change the name a few days ago. We wrote to the Directorate of Primary Education to take the necessary action in this regard,” said Ministry of Primary and Mass Education Secretary Farid Ahammad.
The Ministry of Primary and Mass Education has been organising the ‘Bangabandhu Gold Cup Primary School Football Tournament’ since 2010 and ‘Bangamata Sheikh Fazilatunnesa Mujib Gold Cup Primary School Football Tournament’ since 2011 every year for the primary students in government school.
However, the tournaments were not held in 2020 and 2021 due to the onset of the coronavirus pandemic.
As many as 1.7 million students from 65,566 schools took part in the tournament this year. Former prime minister Sheikh Hasina attended the final matches in April.
Amid the reforms in many sectors since the fall of the Hasina government on Aug 5, the tournaments have now been renamed.
The ministry wrote to the field officers of the DPE to take necessary actions after it decided to change the tournament name, DPE Assistant Director Mohammad Nazrul Islam told bdnews24.com.
“In an order signed on Nov 7, the ministry informed the directorate about the change of tournament name. The field level officers were written to take measures accordingly,” he said.