Hyderabad: Chaos at Ind-Aus T20 ticket sale

Hyderabad: The failure of Hyderabad Cricket Association (HCA) in making proper arrangements for the sale of tickets for the India-Australia match to be held at Uppal Stadium on Sunday led to utter chaos, lathi charge and injuries to over 20 cricket fans who thronged the Gymkhana Grounds since wee hours of Thursday. They were rushed to private hospitals in the city.

As the sale of tickets for the T-20 match began at the counter, the crowd surged and tried to gate crash into the sales counters at the Grounds. In the melee, several people fell and sustained injuries. On the other hand, the police were seen busy at the counters taking 5 to 10 tickets.

The crush of cricket enthusiasts occurred as the ticket sale started at three counters at the Gymkhana grounds. The queues were seen up to Paradise signal. Nearly 30,000 people were waiting in long lines for only 3,000 tickets for Sunday's match and the police were using batons to try and control the crowd. The enthusiasm was high as for the last three years, as the people could not see a live match in the stadium due to Covid-19 pandemic.

When the ticket sale began at the counter, they rushed towards the gates, resulting in near stampede. As the situation went out of control, the police resorted to lathi-charge. The angry fans raised the slogans 'HCA down-down'. The people at the Gymkhana Grounds told The Hans India that the management had not made proper arrangements for the sale of tickets.

"It was a clear case of hopeless management by the HCA. I tried to buy tickets online but failed as they were not available. Now there is utter chaos," said Mayank, an IT employee who was in a queue since early morning.

Those who were lucky to reach up to the counter said the HCA told them that tickets of Rs 850 and 1,200 only were available. This indicates that a lot of corruption had taken place, they said. Usheer Ahmed, a resident of L B Nagar, said that when he wanted to buy a ticket for a premier gallery costing Rs 3,500 but they were not available. This indicates that black marketing had taken place, he added.

Rajaskehar, who opted for online booking, was in for a shock as he booked three tickets through Paytm app and money was deducted. But after 10 minutes, he received a message saying that his tickets have been cancelled and money refunded.