No access to drinking water for spectators at the MCA Stadium on a hot and humid day in Pune led to chaos and complaints of sickness among the fans who came to watch the first day of the second Test between India and New Zealand.
During the lunch break, hundreds of spectators queued up near the North Stand for water, which was unavailable at the time. Police intervention was needed to manage that crowd. Around 20 people complained of dehydration and giddiness and needed attention at the first-aid kiosk at the North Stand. With temperatures over 30 degrees celsius, a member of the staff at that kiosk suggested that there were more cases of dehydration in other stands.
The MCA stadium, located in the outskirts of Pune near the expressway to Mumbai, has a capacity of 37,000, and almost 18,000 spectators turned up for the third Test match at the venue and first since 2019. More than half of those spectators had to brave the heat and humidity as only six stands at the MCA stadium have a roof.
The MCA had promised free water during this game, but amid the chaos, a number of fans ended up buying water from vendors at high prices. One fan said he had spent more on water bottles than his ticket for the entire Test match.
Once water was made available to the spectators the MCA secretary Kamlesh Pisal apologised to the fans and said that more water booths would be set up across the stands from Friday.
"We can only apologise to the fans for inconvenience caused," Pisal told reporters. "But we want to assure them, through MCA, that this won't be repeated, and everything will be taken care of.
"Considering the scorching heat, we had decided to provide cold water. In our previous experience, the fans had complained about us providing warm water or boiling water. We, as management, thought we would provide them with cold water, so we had kept cool cages. Once the water in cool cages finished, we tried to refill it with the same cold water, and in that process, it got delayed. We have done a recce of the entire water in stands and will make sure everything is refilled properly tonight to avoid such situations."