Akshay lights ‘The Flame Of Hope’

The star with the Midas touch at the box office, Akshay Kumar is also the brand ambassador for Special Olympics. He was in Delhi along with Chief Minister Sheila Dikshit who opened the five-day-long games at the Jawaharlal Nehru Stadium. Akshay Kumar accompanied with a special athlete lit the 'Flame Of Hope'. The Special Olympics called 'Bharat' (India), is aimed at reaching the physically and mentally challenged through the world of sports.

The aim of Special Olympics is to provide year-round sports training and athletic competition in a variety of Olympic-type sports for children and adults with intellectual disabilities by giving them continuing opportunities to develop physical fitness, demonstrate courage, experience joy, and participate in a sharing of gifts, skills, and friendship with their families, other Special Olympics athletes and the community.

Special Olympics, an international organization founded by Eunice Kennedy Shriver in 1968 provides people with intellectual disabilities opportunities to realize their potential and promotes them to grow and develop. Today, it is the largest sports movement for the differently-abled. Recognized by the International Olympics Committee, more than a million athletes are today part of the unique movement.

Akshay Kumar is the goodwill ambassador for the Special Olympics in a bid to spread awareness about the event in which 60,000 athletes will participate. Akshay takes his job and responsibility very seriously. On the occasion, Akshay Kumar said, 'We should treat them equal and they should deserve the same respect, fame and adulation like any other normal athletes.'

Akshay Kumar's new mission these days is to 'bring a smile on the faces of children who are deprived of sunshine. He had earlier appealed to the media to write about the mentally challenged. 'There's nothing shameful about being psychologically challenged. Such people need to live their lives normally. Because they're normal people. 'There're 30 million mentally challenged people in India. Of these 95 percent live their lives in anonymity. Their own parents and families treat them as shameful secrets. That's so wrong.'

Source:glamsham.com