The Current 'LIFE'...

Review of The Kick Boxing Tournament, Pune

  For the first time attending a tournament of this kind, we were damn excited since me and my colleagues had won at the District Level. The Balewadi Stadium's infrastructure was amazing and was at par with international standards. The atmosphere gave us a feeling of being a SPORT'S PERSON. Flora and fauna in the campus kept us always fresh. On viewing  the Swimming, Gymnastics, Athletics, and the Boxing arenas, i felt like chucking my engineering and reside there for ever. By God's grace it never rained at crucial moments.

  It is said dat one cant stay happy for a long tym, sadness by default follows happines. So here the tables started turning against us. Sadness included prolonged waits, boredom, struggle to get things done, lack of information abt the style, cheating etc etc. The entire first day went in running here and there just to get an accommodation but at the end, it was worth it since we were straight away placed in the hostel even though it was a mile away from the ring. From the 2nd day onwards, the TRUE COLORS of the organisers started comming in front which showed that their only intension was 'MONEY'. I even heard the head of the tournament instructing the officials, coaches and the managers to charge as much as they want from the students and the decision rested upon them. It seemed like the fights were being held just for the formality sake. 

  Along with the organisers, certain infact most of the participants were also responsible. Seemed like half of the crowd had come jus to get their hands on those handsome "25 MARKS" since a mere participation would fetch it for them and hence resulting in an increased number of participation. The victims of this were the sincere fighters. Each match was brought down to one round of one minute from 3 rounds of 2 minutes each. My entire group had a picture of the latter and had prepared according to it since the district level was held in a similar fashion. Once the government stops granting those marks, the tournament will be held in the actual sense.

   Inspite of being a state level tournament, amateur referees were placed to carry on the fights and were guided by a senior one from the ring side. I guess they didn't find any other better place to TRAIN THEM. I witnessed the most shocking decisions which i had never seen before in the past 13 years as a martial artist. I would like to bring a few of them to your notice.

1-) The score keeper signals that the BLUE CORNER WINS to the referee but the latter raises the hand of the RED CORNER. On objecting, he says "NOW I HAVE GIVEN THE DECISION AND NOTHING CAN HAPPEN" (as if he was damn professional). This happened twice and that too my own class friends fell prey to it.

2-) My friend knocks down his opponent and he fails to respond for the 10 counts. As a result, my friend is declared as the winner. But suddenly a senior referee pops up in between and orders for a REMATCH claiming that the PERSON COULD NOT HEAR THE 10 COUNTS.

3-) The idiots give a warning saying 'ROUND PUNCH IS NOT ALLOWED' (guess they forgot that it was a kick boxing match going on) and also did not know the difference between a SWEEP and a KICK ON THE LEGS.

4-)On raising an objection abt the absence of Shin pad in the opponents gear, the referee says "Its not mentioned in the RULE BOOK abt the compulsion of the SHIN PADS" where as it was. We were laughing our ass out. 

   Actually SHIT!!! happens every where, and since it was a tournament organised by the GOVERNMENT, some extra shit was expected.

  The day ended at 7 pm on day 2 and when it was 8 at night on the 3rd day, none of us expected our fights to be announced at that time. Hence we all had packed up and were ready to leave for our rooms. But all of a sudden, no where out of the blue, the announcer started calling our respective categories and my entire group pressed the panic button. We all entered the ring without a proper mind set and warm up. And soon after some time, one by one i started getting the news that this friend lost, that friend lost (Even i lost.. Lol).

  But we all were happy since none of us WON (natural human tendency u may say). I saw some great fighters in this span of 4 days and also learnt a lot by observing them fight. Hope next year, this note has much of the positive aspects as compared to this year.