February 27, 2014.

In an increasingly competitive world, where victory at any cost is the unwritten code, a distinguished old boy of St Joseph’s College, Maradana T. Don Augustine urged the students of his school to be ‘gentlemen athletes and sportsmen forever’, while stressing the importance of sports in general and athletics in particular for the complete development of the human personality Tanterimudalige Don Augustine a crack athlete of St Joseph’s College, Maradana in the 1940s, who even won the one mile event at the western schools’ group athletic meet in 1948 made the above plea as the Chief Guest at the school’s Inter-House Athletic Meet 2014 held early this month.

"Sport also inculcates in the participants the qualities of sportsmanship, determination, discipline, courage and a ‘never say die’ attitude in facing the many challenges of the future. It also trains you to accept victory and defeat in a spirit of humility and good grace, while at the same time developing a healthy mind in a healthy body," he said.

Augustine reminded the students that St Joseph’s "is not a glorified tutory, churning out lopsided academics. It is a hallowed seat of learning, dedicated to the total development of the human personality, in body, mind and spirit."

He said: "All you participants, must drink deep from this fountain of learning and grow out to be dutiful and law-abiding citizens of our dear country, with respect for law and order and the rights of others."

At a time when youth are increasingly turning against their own teachers and principals, the Octogenarian called upon young Josephians to do nothing to smear and tarnish the image of the hallowed seat of learning or to undermine the dignity, authority and the image of the "Rector of our beloved college and at all times to follow the path of its noble traditions".