VISAKHAPATNAM: Disappointed public entered into heated arguments with the staff of various Mee-Seva centres across the city, alleging that the latter pre-blocked tickets for the T20 match and issued meagre number of tickets out of the allotted ones.
For the third T20 match between India and Sri Lanka, slated to be held in the city on Feb 14, the officials started selling tickets of `300 and `600 from 18 Mee-Seva centres on Thursday.
Youngsters in large number turned out at various centres in the early hour of the day to buy a ticket to see their favourite cricketers play.
The centres in MVP colony, Suryabagh, Seethammadhara, Dondaparthy, China Waltair and other areas witnessed maximum crowd.
When the centres ran out of ticket stock, people pointed out that the officials were supposed to give away 2000 tickets of `300 and 5,900 tickets of `600 through the Mee-Seva centres.
“All the centres started selling tickets at around 8.15 am and by 8.45 am, staff announced that all the tickets were sold out. Only a handful of people bought the tickets, then how will the tickets dry out in half an hour?” questioned S Prakash, a B.Tech student from Arilova.
Meanwhile, joint collector J Nivas inspected many centres, where the officials maintained a disciplined sale, though at a few centres police had to intervene to control the crowd. Public claimed that similar issues prevailed during the IFR.