Meryick D'Silva
Daijiworld Media Network - Mangaluru (MD)

Mangaluru, Feb 27: Mangala Stadium has always been popular hub for the health-conscious, young and old alike. People flock to the stadium for jogging, walking or using its facilities for their daily dose of exercise. However, a sudden move to ban the public from entering the stadium has left the people both surprised and devastated.

The district stadium committee held a meeting with deputy commissioner (DC) A B Ibrahim along with the minister for youth empowerment, sports and fisheries, Abhaychandra Jain on February 25 and passed an order that says only athletes and trainers will be allowed to enter the stadium and engage themselves in training, while the public will be banned from entering inside the stadium. The public has been informed to instead use the walker's path located outside the stadium.

This has made the people fume and protest. They say that M R Poovamma, the athlete from Dakshina Kannada district who has earned internation fame, wants to train on the synthetic track stadium and therefore the public is not allowed inside. The people are demanding that the district stadium committee specify a training time for Poovamma and let the stadium for the public use during the rest of the hours.

Speaking to Daijiworld, Girish Karanth, senior district level racewalker said, "The district stadium committee has informed the public that four days ago, they had recieved complaint from a person alleging that public caused some trouble during training sessions. For this reason senior people and other members of the public are banned from the stadium. We have submitted a memorandum to the committee. This is not a protest, this is our request to the goverment to grant us permission to enter the stadium.

"Poovamma and her brother had recently complained to the DC that public was disturbing them and not allowing them to train. But a lot of people said that Poovamma and her brother and other athletes do not cooperate with others and that their behaviour is not appropriate," he added.

Unfortunately, the website of the department of youth empowerment and sports which is run by the state government shows wrong contact number of the office of assistant director, Dakshina Kannada.

Panduranga Gowda, deputy director of youth services and sports, Dakshina Kannada district said, "Federation Cup tournament is going to start from May 1, 2015 and athletes are busy traning. A few days back Poovamma had some problems with the public as people were using the synthetic track to walk when Poovamma and other athletes were training. So this made Poovamma complain to the DC."

He also said that the public is banned up till the Federation Cup is over and later it would be decided whether to make the ban permanent or withdraw it. "Right now we request the public to cooperate with us," he added.