Monday, November 29, 1999

The Kodagu turf

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Old bonds are renewed and new friendships made, as families from Coorg gather for the 14th edition of the Kodagu hockey festival in KarnatakaThis is not just a hockey festival. Here old bonds are renewed, old disputes settled and new brides and bridegrooms are found," says 69-year-old Pandanda Kuttappa. He shouts to be heard over the din generated by a crowd of 15,000 at the makeshift hockey stadium in Ponnampet, a small town in the hockey-crazy Kodagu hill district of Karnataka, ahead of a quarter-final tie between two families of the region's ethnic Kodava community.In what's now an annual ritual, well-turned-out Kodava families turn up every April to fill the stands. The women are in their saris, worn the traditional Kodava way, elderly men reveal the rich military tradition of the region with their carefully turned up moustaches and the young are dressed in global cool.When the whistle blows, signalling the start of the quarter-final match between the Nellamakkadas and the Mandepandas, the stadium goes quiet. Every move on the hockey field is scrutinised closely."Steady Mandepandas, steady Mandepandas," shouts a 10-year-old girl from the stands after her team surges into an early lead. "Keep the ball, keep the ball," shouts a middle-aged man, also from the Mandepanda section of the crowd. There are gasps and sighs all around for the daintiest of stick work unleashed by the players.Hockey is a way of life for the 1.5 lakh Kodavas, residents of Kodagu or Coorg, in Karnataka. Everybody here seems to know the nuances of the game. This year, the 16 teams in the quarter-finals for the 14th edition of the hockey tournament come from 214 family teams.Founded in 1997 by the 69-year-old Pandanda Kuttappa, a former hockey player and umpire, to check the slide of hockey in the region, the Kodava Hockey Festival has now become a distinct part of the Kodagu culture.Every April, for the last 14 years, when schools and colleges are closed and the coffee cultivation cycle is over, the Kodava families gather to indulge for 20 days in one of their pet passions.When Kuttappa organised the first edition of the family tournament in 1997, called the Pandanda Cup, he spent Rs 10 lakh from his own pocket, and got 60 families to participate. In 2003, when the Kaliyanda family hosted the Cup, the number of teams touched 280. The Kodava Hockey Festival now calls itself "the biggest hockey tournament in the world".This year, the tournament, hosted by the Maneyapanda family, has seen a giant leap in terms of spend and organisation. For the first time, a full-fledged stadium, although temporary, has been created for the tournament. As much as Rs 1.2 crore has been raised for the event with over a dozen sponsors coming forward, says Maneyapanda N Chittiappa, a Bangalore-based businessman and one of the chief organisers from the Maneyapanda family.Among the added attractions the Maneyapanda family threw in this year for the hockey festival are helicopter rides for Rs 3,000 per head. But with more takers for hockey than the joyrides, the helicopter fun lasted only for three days.The Maneyapanda family has also thrown in a beer garden and an outdoor restaurant that serves, among other things, some traditional Kodava delicacies as part of the festival.The Kodavas have in recent times become a largely affluent community on the strength of their coffee plantations and coffee prices. Hockey has, however, been a central part of the lives of the warrior tribe, alongside service in the defence forces and a love for liquor."There is a common saying that a Kodava is born with a hockey stick in one hand and a gun or a bottle of rum in the other," says 32-year-old Sachin Bopanna, an event management professional in Bangalore who turns out for the Nellamakkada family—already three-time winners of the family tournament and semi-finalists in the Maneyapanda 2010 event.The district has produced as many as 60 India internationals and seven hockey Arjuna awardees over the years. Since 1966, Kodagu has contributed at least one player to every Indian team. Every family team at the hockey festival has at least four fulcrum players who have competed or are currently competing at the highest levels of the sport."No parent in Coorg will stop their children from playing hockey. Hockey has been a means for livelihood for many," says A B Subbaiah, Olympian and India goalkeeper for over 12 years, who plays for the Anjaparavanda family, winners of the Alamengada family cup in the 2008 edition of the family festival.Despite Kodagu being an epicentre for hockey in southern India, almost a Sansarpur of the south, the region is just getting its first astro-turf ground. With Sports Minister M.S. Gill inaugurating the event this year and getting a first-hand glimpse of the enthusiasm for the game, hockey fans in Kodagu are now hoping that the region will get at least another astro turf.

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