KATHMANDU, April 18 -- An official opening ceremony of bi-annual Eighth National Games is set to be held on Thursday at the renovated Nepalgunj Stadium, Banke. The matches were already started eight days ago with majority of the sports already played before the inauguration.

President Bidhya Devi Bhandari will officially inaugurate the event.

An opening ceremony of around 2 hours and 32 minutes will feature acts from 1500 performers including Nepal Army's Khukhuri drill, a combined dance performance from 500 students, among others.

The players who are participating in different events at Dang, Bhairahawa, Butwal, Kathmandu and Lalitpur like cricket, football, squash, gold, etc will not be able to feature in the ceremony. These categori...