The Mysuru Kambala event has come under pressure from farmer, Dalit rights and environmental groups, which have urged organisers to withdraw and the Karnataka government to cancel the event because of drought and water scarcity across the state.
Members of the Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha, Dalit Sangharsha Samiti and Parisarakkaagi Naavu made the appeal at a press conference in Mangaluru. They said owners of Kambala buffaloes from Dakshina Kannada and Udupi districts should voluntarily withdraw from the Mysuru event because the animals could face distress in the heat.
A.T. Ramaswamy, president of Parisarakkaagi Naavu, said the immediate priority should be addressing the water problems faced by farmers and the public. He said the groups were not opposed to Kambala, which they described as a traditional folk sport of Tulu Nadu, but argued that the event should be held after good rainfall rather than during a drought.
Ramaswamy said drought conditions prevailed in more than 200 taluks of Karnataka and that groundwater levels were declining. He also claimed that hundreds of villages were facing severe drinking-water shortages. The groups questioned the use of what they described as lakhs of litres of water for the event while farmers and residents were struggling with inadequate supplies.
The groups cited conditions in Mysuru district to support their demand. According to Ramaswamy, 2,928 of the district’s 2,991 lakes had dried up, while only 63 remained full because of canal water. He also said borewells within a 10-kilometre radius of Mysuru city had dried up and that water levels in the Cauvery, Kabini, Hemavathi and Harangi reservoirs had fallen.
The proposed event site has also become part of the dispute. Badagalapura Nagendra, president of the Karnataka Rajya Raitha Sangha, said the land had originally been reserved for a park and had provided habitat for trees, shrubs, small animals and birds. He alleged that more than 50 trees had been cut to facilitate the Kambala event and said the Forest Department had registered a first information report over the tree cutting.
The groups linked their protest to the state’s drought-relief response as well. Ramaswamy criticised the government’s reported crop-loss compensation of ₹2,500 for drought-hit farmers, calling it an insult. He said farmers planned to return ₹2,501 to the Chief Minister’s Relief Fund after the compensation was credited to their accounts.
The report did not include a response from the Karnataka government, the Kambala organisers or the Forest Department to the demands and allegations. The immediate question for the authorities is whether the event will proceed at the designated Mysuru site while the groups’ objections over water use, drought conditions and tree cutting remain unresolved.
