KOLKATA
\nLionel Messi\u2019s tour of India kicked off chaotically on Saturday as fans threw objects, ripped up seats and invaded the pitch at Kolkata\u2019s Salt Lake stadium after the Argentine soccer great made only a brief appearance at a ticketed event.
\nSatadru Dutta, the event\u2019s chief organiser, has been detained by police, said Rajeev Kumar, director general of West Bengal police.
\nMessi was scheduled for a 45-minute visit to the stadium, but his appearance lasted just 20 minutes. Tickets for the event were priced from around 3,500 rupees ($38.65)\u2013more than half of average weekly income in India\u2013but one fan said he had paid $130.
\nFans in the Salt Lake stadium in the capital of the Eastern state of West Bengal threw ripped-up seats and other objects onto the field, while several people climbed a fence around the field and hurled objects.
\n\u201cI can\u2019t believe there was so much mismanagement,\u201d said Eddie Lal Hmangaihzuala, who had travelled nearly 1,500 km from Mizoram over two days to attend the event.
\n\u201cMessi left quickly, I think he felt unsafe. I hardly got a glimpse of him,\u201d he told Reuters.
\nThe organisers of the tour did not immediately respond to a request for a comment.
\n\u201cWe\u2019ve already detained the main organiser,\u201d Rajeev Kumar told reporters. \u201cWe\u2019re taking action so that this mismanagement does not go unpunished.
\n\u201cHe has already pledged in writing that tickets sold for the event should be refunded,\u201d he added.
\nChief minister apologises, orders probe
\nMessi is in India as part of a tour during which he is scheduled to attend concerts, youth football clinics and a padel tournament, and to launch charitable initiatives at events in Kolkata, Hyderabad, Mumbai and New Delhi.
\nThe chief minister of West Bengal, Mamata Banerjee, apologised to Messi and ordered a probe into the incident.
\n\u201cI am deeply disturbed and shocked by the mismanagement witnessed today at Salt Lake stadium,\u201d Banerjee, who was on her way to the event when chaos broke out, posted on X.
\n\u201cI sincerely apologise to Lionel Messi, as well as to all sports lovers and his fans, for the unfortunate incident,\u201d she said.
\nShe said she was constituting a committee to conduct a detailed enquiry into the incident, assign responsibility, and recommend measures to prevent such occurrences in the future.
\nWest Bengal, Kerala and Goa states have long had large soccer followings in otherwise cricket-crazed India.
\nMultiple incidents of fan riots have taken place at Salt Lake stadium, including during a Kolkata derby match between East Bengal and Mohun Bagan in 2012 which was abandoned after a brick thrown from the stands hit a player, seriously injuring him.
\nArgentine soccer great Diego Maradona twice visited Kolkata, and in 2017 unveiled a statue there of himself holding the World Cup in the presence of thousands of fans.
\nMessi, who captained Argentina for the first time in a friendly match at the Salt Lake stadium in a 1-0 win over Venezuela in 2011, virtually unveiled a 70-foot statue of himself in Kolkata earlier on Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
KOLKATA Lionel Messi\u2019s tour of India kicked off chaotically on Saturday as fans threw objects, ripped up seats and invaded the pitch at Kolkata\u2019s Salt Lake stadium after the Argentine soccer great made only a brief appearance at a ticketed event. Satadru Dutta, the event\u2019s chief organiser, has been detained by police, said Rajeev Kumar, …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":91022,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-91012","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91012","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=91012"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91012\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":91023,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/91012\/revisions\/91023"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/91022"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=91012"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=91012"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=91012"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}