HYDERABAD: After the Nizam College grounds and the LB Stadium, the Saroor Nagar Indoor Stadium has become the latest venue preferred for political meetings. The increasing number of meetings being held there is grossly affecting sporting activities in the stadium besides traffic in the area.
During a recent meeting in the open-air ground where AICC president Rahul Gandhi addressed a crowd of more than 60,000 people, the venue was booked for three days in a row. But, due to the preparations that went into setting up the venue and taking it down, it took five days. Its effect, sporting activities were not conducted for five days. “Any political meeting here steals five days of training days for sports persons who come here from across the city.
The situation gets worse when they have no place to get training when state and national competitions are scheduled,” pointed out E Venkateshwar Rao, administrator, Saroor Nagar Indoor Stadium. When Express visited the stadium, the wooden floor was in a damaged condition on account of constant wear and tear. In total, nine sporting activities including athletics, badminton, gymnastics, kabaddi, cricket and badminton were affected in the 19-acre stadium. Unlike LB Stadium, where the grass on the central ground is damaged on such occasions, the indoor stadium has imported synthetic mats, wooden floor, and a full-fledged gymnastics equipment. And, for every meeting, the equipment has suffers wear and tear.
“Outdoor activities affect the quality of soil but it is the indoor meetings that bother us more. We have imported equipment from Italy and the synthetic wooden flooring takes a lot of beating whenever a meeting is held,” Rao added. The ongoing work at LB Nagar is already affecting the traffic and during public meetings the situation turns worse.
Sports persons, walkers to move HC
The 2,000-odd walkers and about 500 sports persons have complained to the officials but to no avail. They are now mooting to file a PIL in court to stop renting of sports centres for public events.