Stung by the VIP culture

The postponement of Pinkathon, an international run to raise awareness about breast cancer, has left the expatriates fuming.

As several women in the City geared up to run at Pinkathon, an international run to promote women’s health and fitness as well as raise awareness about breast cancer, Rahul Gandhi’s visit to Bangalore last weekend threw the schedule off-track. 

While many women have taken the postponement by a week sportingly (originally scheduled for February 16 and now rescheduled for February 23), some are fuming about it.

 Expatriates in Bangalore, who had planned to run the race, describe the entire situation as ridiculous.

Penny from the United Kingdom, who has been in the City for over four years, says, “I cannot believe that one person can affect a good cause, to which thousands of women were looking forward to. Anyway, the race was scheduled for early in the morning when there would have hardly been any traffic movement.” She adds, “It’s a female-only event, in aid of breast cancer awareness. What better example of women empowerment, that too when the very thing is being peddled by the VIP in question.” 

Pointing out that Bangalore has emerged as the breast cancer capital, Meredith from the United States of America, who has been training hard for the event for the last one month, says, “It’s an important event especially since the City has come to be known as the breast cancer capital. I was going to participate in the 10K run for which I had put in a lot of effort.

It’s really disappointing particularly since I will not be able to take part in the race this Sunday as I have other commitments.” 
Meredith goes on to add, “I haven’t pursued for a refund because the money is going towards a good cause. But what upsets me is that thousands of women have been affected by the change, many of whom will not be able to take part because of the sudden change in dates.” 

Sina, an expatriate from Germany, rues that the participants weren’t informed. “The least they could have done was to inform us about the change directly. It was on the internet and I just happened to get to know. If I hadn’t checked, I wouldn’t even have known,” she says. Sina, who was running 10K and has spent a lot of time training says, “If something like this would have happened back home, we would have been informed.”

Silvia, from Italy who has been living in the City since the last one year says that she is not angry but saddened by the situation.

 “There is so much talk about the rights of women but what happened just goes to show that one man can change that all. The group of women were going to be running early in the morning, which was hardly going to inconvenience the VIP. If something like this would have happened in my country, people would have protested about the situation. I wish people here would also raise their voices. Probably, I assume that something like this is very normal here. But for us, it’s very new,” explains Silvia, who is travelling out of town and will not be able to take part in Pinkathon this weekend.