Sri Lankan Sunway Students Are Kabaddi Champs!
A “kabaddi” match was held recently between local and international students from Malaysia, India, the Maldives and Sri Lanka of Sunway University College. The match was one of the highlights of the Indian Cultural week organised by the Indian Cultural Society which is a student’s society that promotes Indian culture. Two Canadian International Matriculation Programme lecturers Allen Warren Burrell and Steve Anderson threw off their shoes and wrist watches to join one of the teams in one of the oldest games in the world.
The traditional game has five members in each team with a court that has two sides. The game starts when a “raider” enters the opponent’s court chanting “kabaddi” repeatedly in one breath while the opponent players try to keep the raider in their court. The aim of the raider is to touch one of the opposing team members and then return to his court. The game can get interesting when the raider comes into “struggling” contact with his opponents.
The two teams, one consisting of Allen, Steve and Indian students and the other of Sri Lankan students, put up a brave fight. The teams managed to keep the raider in check but sometimes the enthusiastic “anti-raiders” and the raider would become entwined in a semi-wrestling situation. Nevertheless the match ended with a score of 52 to the Sri Lankans and 45 to Allen and Steve’s team and no one was hurt except for one or two bruised egos!
The game originated from the Indian state of Tamil Nadu and is played in Punjab and the rest of India and throughout the world in Bangladesh, Iran, South Asia, South East Asia. It is usually played by males to display their strength to their future brides.
Sunway University College is one of the first private universities to hold such a game among their students and staff. It hopes to make this an annual event.
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