Mysuru Kambala is facing opposition from farmer, Dalit rights and environmental groups, which have urged buffalo owners from Dakshina Kannada and Udupi to withdraw voluntarily from the event because Karnataka is experiencing drought conditions.
The organisations also called on the government to cancel the Mysuru Kambala. Speaking at a press conference, A.T. Ramaswamy, president of the Parisarakkaagi Naavu organisation, said public attention should be directed towards easing the water shortage affecting farmers and residents.
Ramaswamy said the groups were not opposed to Kambala, the traditional folk sport of the Tulu region, but argued that the event should not be held while large parts of the state are facing water stress. He said Kambala could be organised after adequate rainfall.
According to the statements reported by Prajavani, the groups claimed that more than 200 taluks in Karnataka are affected by drought. They also expressed concern that buffaloes participating in the event could suffer because of high temperatures.
Ramaswamy said groundwater levels were falling and that hundreds of villages were facing severe drinking-water shortages. He questioned the use of what he described as lakhs of litres of water for the event while farmers and residents were struggling with inadequate supplies.
He also cited figures for Mysuru district, saying that 2,928 of its 2,991 lakes had dried up and that only 63 remained full because of canal water. He further claimed that borewells within a 10-kilometre radius of Mysuru city had dried up, while water levels in the Cauvery, Kabini, Hemavati and Harangi reservoirs had declined.
The groups raised a separate environmental objection concerning the site identified for the event. Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha president Badagalapura Nagendra said the land had originally been reserved for a park and contained hundreds of trees, shrubs and habitats for small animals and birds.
Nagendra alleged that more than 50 trees had been cut to prepare the site for Kambala. He said the Forest Department had registered a first information report over the tree felling. The report does not include details of the FIR, including the date, sections invoked or the current status of the investigation.
The organisations also criticised the government’s crop-loss compensation for drought-hit farmers. Ramaswamy described the announced compensation of ₹2,500 as an insult to farmers and said farmers planned to return ₹2,501 to the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund after the compensation was credited to their accounts.
The statements reported by Prajavani represent the position of the organisations that addressed the press conference. The report does not include a response from the state government, the event organisers, the Forest Department or the buffalo owners. It also does not state whether the Mysuru Kambala has been cancelled or whether the administration has issued a decision on the event.
