As the soon-to-start Commonwealth Games (CWG) is getting mired in one controversy after another and is being flagged as a national shame, people of one village in Karnataka are upset more than anybody else. It’s Kalmady, the native place of CWG Organising Committee chief Suresh Kalmadi near Udupi.
Suresh Kalmadi’s father and grandfather used to live in this village, but moved out 50 years ago. As Suresh Kalmadi’s name has been popping up in the media in connection to the Games, the locals of Kalmady village feel that the name of their village is getting tarnished. “We are not worried about the conduct of the Games, we are perturbed because the name of our village keeps popping up for the wrong reasons on national media every time Suresh Kalmadi’s name is mentioned,” said the Kalmady Yuvaka Sangha members.
Former president of the Udupi Town Municipal Council Somashekar Bhat, also a close associate of the new state minister of higher education VS Acharya said, “I feel bad about the controversies surrounding Suresh Kalmadi and CWG. People have been asking me and my party workers about what’s been happening.”
Sudharkar Salian, a political leader in Kalmady told DNA, that he plans to send a letter to the media saying: “We disown the name Kalmady attached to a controversial person like Suresh Kalmadi.
However, there is one comforting factor that Suresh Kalmadi’s surname is being spelt as ‘Kalmadi’ and not ‘Kalmady’, the name of our village.”
