About 2,000 fans who waited to buy offline tickets for Monday’s IPL match, between Royal Challengers Bangalore and Chennai Super Kings, since Saturday night were furious to learn that the tickets were sold out.
The angry fans, who waited for hours outside Gate 2 of the M Chinnaswamy Stadium, demanded an explanation.
Deputy Commissioner of Police (Central) R Srinivas Gowda confirmed that police lathi-charged the crowd in an attempt to disperse them.
A police officer posted outside Gate 2 said: “We tried to convince people to move after the announcement, but they were understandably agitated."
Another police officer added that 'sold-out' boards had been displayed for the past three days but the crowd was not informed of the scarcity of gallery tickets.
Many fans who waited outside the stadium gates expressed their disappointment over what they claimed was mismanagement on the part of both the team and the stadium officials.
"We were told there would be tickets sold offline on April 14 and 16. We’ve been waiting since Saturday night to buy tickets, but this morning they didn’t open the counters at all. They then announced that tickets have been sold out despite not selling even a single ticket,” said a distraught Saurabh, who came all the way from Belagavi to watch the RCB Vs CSK match.
He added that there was no notification of offline tickets being unavailable on the RCB website or any of its social media pages, which further angered the crowd.
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