The cries of “Bengaluru Kambala, Namma Kambala” rent the air as hundreds of pairs of colourfully-decked buffaloes and their athletic jockeys took to the jodu kare or double slush tracks, marking the beginning of the Bengaluru Kambala at Palace Grounds in the city on Saturday.
The two-day event is the first ever Kambala (slush track buffalo race) to be held in the State capital. The unique traditional sport from the coastal region of Karnataka captured pan-Indian imagination through Rishab Shetty’s 2022 blockbuster film, Kantara. The current edition in Bengaluru is part of the effort to popularise it among the urban population and promote it for breed conservation of the Indian buffalo.
