Kambala evokes a sense of festive fervour in Coastal Karnataka. For other mortals, Kambala is a traditional buffalo racing annual event conducted in the Tulu Nadu Region of Karnataka which consists of Mangalore, Udupi, Puttur etc. This racing event caught national attention when Srinivas Gowda, a Kambala Jockey beat the world record of Usain Bolt and people declared Srinivas Gowda the fastest man on the Planet.
Interestingly, if we study the association of kambala and buffaloes it seems quite odd. This is because Buffaloes are not a native animal to Karnataka. If you look at all the native breeds of Buffaloes in India, almost all of them below to Northern India except Toda which is is native to Nilgiris in Tamil Nadu. So then how did an ancient traditional race involving the local Tuluva landlords and kings of Karnataka region get Buffaloes into the Kambala?
The Answer is Buffaloes were never native to Kambala race. If one looks at similar races in the Asian pacific region, we find a race called Pacu Jawi from Indonesia which is very similar to the Kambala race the only difference being it is a cow bull race. We need to go a step further and understand the motive of such races in the olden days. For this, we need to understand the much talked about and controversial event – Jallikattu.
Jallikattu is a traditional cow bull taming festival in Tamil Nadu which has been going on for centuries. The single most achievement of Jallikattu event is that, this heritage race has managed to preserve the germ plasma of the native A2 cow breeds of Tamil Nadu. The reason being, the poor farmers have a reason to raise cow bulls which otherwise have no financial viability for the farmer. Because, there is monetary gain attached to A2 cow bull owners at the event, they raise these A2 cow bulls and also groom them physically for the event. The result being the breeds kept getting stronger and stronger as most potent cow bulls were chosen for further breeding with female cows. Over the course of centuries, this phenomenon kept enriching the genepool of many native cow breeds of Tamil Nadu.
Now if one looks at the current status of native A2 cow breeds of Karnataka especially of the Coastal region, we find that breeds like Malnad Gidda have significantly deteriorated over the course of time. The reason being there was never a financial incentive for farmers to raise Male bull cows. The result being poor farmers often sold off their male bull cows to slaughter houses. Malnad Gidda bulls started becoming unavailable. Hence, farmers started artificially inseminating female Malnad Gidda cows with A1 breeds such as Jersey and HF semen.
So how do we link Malnad Gidda breed, Kambala and Jallikattu. It is clear that Jallikattu event has managed to develop the germplasm of many A2 cow breeds in Tamilnadu. Hence, the only way to develop the progeny of Malnad Gidda, is to introduce cow bull racing to Kambala. It can be safely assumed that this would have been the actual case many many centuries back as buffaloes were non-existent in this Tulu Nadu region. So are we taking back Kambala to its original heritage? May be or May be not. That apart, if we are able to introduce Malnad Gidda Cow bulls to the Kambala race, that will definitely elevate the current status of Malnad Gidda germplasm.
We can build a financially sustainable model to develop the progeny of Malnad Gidda and in the process #savemalnadgidda from a slow extinction.