The ‘sold out’ banners appearing in the Chinnaswamy Stadium for Sunday’s India-Ireland World Cup cricket match figured in the state legislative assembly on Friday.
The ticket row involving the Karnataka State Cricket Association (KSCA) continues to simmer. The ‘sold out’ banners appearing in the Chinnaswamy Stadium for Sunday’s India-Ireland World Cup cricket match figured in the state legislative assembly on Friday.
Besides, the political class and the city police on Friday rejected the passes for the match offered to them by the KSCA. While the MLAs rejected the tickets on the ground that they were of the P-3 stand which they called was a ‘pardesi stand’ (orphan class), the police took exception to only 30 passes coming their way instead of the usual 100-odd passes.
Drawing the attention of chief minister BS Yeddyurappa in the legislative assembly, Congress member PM Ashok wondered how the ‘sold out’ banners could appear though tickets were not issued at all for general public. “We are seeing reports that tickets are being sold in the black. The government should intervene and take strong measures to ensure that cricket fans and general public get adequate number of tickets,” he said.
His party colleagues UT Khader and NL Narendrababu wanted at least 50% of the tickets to be issued to public and the KSCA to bear the medical expenses of the cricket fans who were injured in police lathicharge last week.
Meanwhile the KSCA has reportedly provided 500 passes for legislators to watch the India-Ireland match. However, speaker KG Bopaiah, reflecting the sentiments of the MLAs, expressed displeasure at the fact that they had been given passes for the low-grade ‘P-3’ stand. The speaker said he would reject the passes and return it.
Pacifying the agitated members, Yeddyurappa assured that the government would take effective measures to see that there was no irregularities in distribution of tickets. He also assured tickets for legislators. KSCA has managed to cause heartburn among the men in khaki too. “We had been receiving 119 such passes for all officers, besides 10 more for the personal use of the police commissioner. But this time, we received only 30 passes raising suspicion over the KSCA’s dubious designs to sell of the passes to others,” said a senior police officer.
“We are supposed to be on alert till the match is over. Any time there may be emergency situation and we have to enter the stadium during such period and the passes do not mean that it is for our personal use. It is purely official in nature as far as we are concerned,” another police officer said.
The top brass of the city police reported to have sent back the 30 passes to the KSCA.
Early this morning, a special bomb disposal squad sanitised the entire stadium as part of the regular exercise. “We had been receiving threats every day and we also received a hoax call this morning forcing us to rush to the stadium,” said an officer.
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