"Chief Minister D.V. Sadananda Gowda directed the police in Bangalore and Mysore not to permit the organisers and sponsors to hold the fest in the two cities as it was against Indian culture,” an official from the chief minister’s office told IANS here.
In the festival, which originated in Spain and spread to other countries over the decades, people hurl tomatoes at each other in frenzied revelry.
Confirming the directive, Bangalore's Additional Police Commissioner Sunil Kumar said the organisers and sponsors such as Goibibo, a travel site and KillerJeans, an apparel firm, have been conveyed that they would not be allowed to hold the fest this weekend.
The chief minister banned the fest after hundreds of citizens petitioned him in person and online told him that such events should not be permitted as wasting a nutritious food item was not only wasteful, but also against Indian ethos.
“We are relieved that Gowda took the initiative in right earnest as it is a luxury to waste tonnes of tomatoes by a chosen few to indulge in fun or revelry,” Bangalorean Akshey Kalra, who launched the campaign against the fest on Change.org, told IANS. Read More
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