Moodabidiri: Australian model swimming training workshop week ‘Aust Swim’ organised by sports department and Alva’s educational foundation was inaugurated by former minister Abhaychandra Jain, on Tuesday.

16 simmers from 6 districts will take part in the workshop.

After inaugurating the workshop Abhaychandra Jain said that now the purpose of constructing modernised swimming pool and synthetic track has been accomplished, as the state level workshop is being held at Moodabidiri.

Chief trainer Partha Varanasi said that people in India die due to drowning in water than Malaria. Each and everyone should be taught how to swim. Swimming training should be made compulsory in schools.

Explaining about ‘Aust Swim’ he said “we have syllabus for everything, but not for swimming. The swimming syllabus is made by taking Australian syllabus as model. The trained swimmers will attend an online exam conducted by Australian officials along with swimming. This is called as ‘Aust Swim’.”

Further MLA Jain also said that fire service personnel will also be trained for swimming as many of the fire personnel at Moodabidiri station doesn’t know how to swim.

Synthetic Track and Swimming Pool Committee Member, Councillor P K Thomas, Praveen Kumar and others were present.