'Dirty linen, smelly rooms': University shooting championship marred by accommodation woes
The FISU World University Championship Shooting that officially opens on Friday started on a rough note after two teams decided to do a sit-in protest after failing to get desirable accommodation.
Team members of Cyprus and Sweden, who are to participate in the championships, were horrified on seeing the condition of hotel rooms they had been assigned.
Dirty linen, smelly rooms and creepy crawlies welcomed them.
The teams immediately packed their bags and left for the hotel lobby of Taj Vivanta in Faridabad, which was touted as the bulletin for the championships as the hotel for all the visiting teams.
The teams occupied the lounge area of the lobby until the time they were not assigned clean rooms.
Delegation head of Cyprus Clair Charalambous confirmed that his team had to wait for hours before new accommodation.
“The official bulletin said our accommodation was to be in Taj but then today morning we were taken to a different hotel. The rooms were dirty. We saw cockroaches there. We immediately drove back to Taj where they denied our requests. Then they told us they will accommodate us and now we are being shifted to another hotel,” Charalambous told The Tribune.
The team has now been housed at Eros Hotel. “My only concern is that my team after shooting at the range get to recharge in a nice room. Anyways, the issue has been solved,” he added.
The championship bid was won by the Association of Indian Universities (AIU) in association of Manav Rachna University, Faridabad.
Interestingly, the hosts had to deal with a similar situation on Thursday when the Great Britain team refused to leave the Karni Singh Shooting Range, venue for the championships, after finding out about shoddy accommodation.
AIU joint secretary Baljit Singh Sekhon was unavailable for comments. Manav Rachna’s director of sports Sarkar Talwar said that the teams had raised the issue and they have been accommodated at different hotels.
“Some teams requested us to change their accommodation and it has been done now. They are all being taken care of,” he clarified.
