Kambala — a word that was until last week known only to the coast of Karnataka and a few elsewhere who were either vouching for or against the sport — has now gained international fame. Thanks to Sreenivas Gowda, whose record performance at the Aikala Kambala was mapped and reported as being ‘faster than that of Usain Bolt’.

The comparison did the magic and he turned into an overnight Internet sensation.

This led to him being invited by Minister of State for Youth Affairs and Sports Kiren Rijiju for trails by top Sports Authority of India (SAI) coaches.

The youngster is under immense pressure and has, as reported, said he doesn’t want to do the trials because running in the fields is not the same as a sprint on the track. But as we spoke to him on Sunday evening he was just back from another Kambala event and kept reiterating, "I only want to run Kambala".

The anxiety is momentary and with support and time (mainly for acclimatisation) he sure will be able to appear for the trials. Given his strides that we have observed in the past few seasons of Kambala, he sure has it in him to even qualify.

But if there is one thing his refrain should get us to think about is, why can we not make room for indigenous sports to be as prestigious and supported as the institutionalised ones? Like his speed, does the talent also have to be ‘mapped’ onto a few ‘recognised’ sports for it to be worthy of applause?

Like we wrote here, this is not the first time a runner has clocked these timings in Kambala. Even this evening, in the semi-finals another runner did clock in 0.01 seconds lesser than Seenu’s record, but he didn't make it to the finals, while Seenu won another three medals this evening.

Nor will anything change for him if he doesn't ‘qualify’ in the trials. Yes, it could be life-changing if he does qualify and then is mentored for larger goals as far as the games are concerned. But amidst all the hullabaloo what we are failing to acknowledge is that, if we make it just about this one runner, are we simply mistaking the finger for the moon.

This school dropout, construction worker’s 13.62 seconds to fame, and our sudden spurred activism of now wanting the system to intervene and ‘identify this sporting talent’ sums up all that is wrong with our way of handling our organic talent and potential.

It is Kambala which has made him a star today. Culture has done for him what the system failed to do. An indigenous practice pitched in to harness that which an institutional setup should have.