Budhia Singh and a young fan at the Bangalore press club on Saturday. (Vitla Images)

Bangalore, May 27: Coach Biranchi Das’s defiant plan to make Budhia Singh run in other states if he were banned in Orissa ran into a roadblock in its first lap today.

Instead of a marathon as Das had promised, the organisers in Bangalore had planned only a 1-km run by the four-year-old. But the police arrived early this morning to stop them in their tracks.

The child, invited by the press club to be felicitated, was to run from the club to the Vidhana Soudha through Bangalore’s streets. But the police wouldn’t let him run in public, in the middle of traffic.

Budhia, however, ran on the cobbled paths inside the club’s premises for a few minutes. The lenses of eager cameramen followed him around the one-and-a-half acres of garden and pathways.

Budhia and Das had been sucked into controversy after the boy suffered severe exhaustion at the end of a 65-km run before TV cameras on May 2 in Orissa.

Last week, the Orissa government petitioned the high court to ban the child from making long-distance runs, citing medical reports that said further marathons might retard his growth, invite crippling bone diseases, enlarge his heart and burn him out.

But Budhia arrived in Bangalore with his coach, who said the boy would be running 20 km here and another marathon in Guntur, Andhra Pradesh, on June 18.

“Let them stop him if they can? he will run in other states,” Das had said in Bhubaneswar before leaving for Bangalore.

The press club, however, said the run would be only over 3 km. Even this was curtailed to 1 km and the event, originally planned for Sunday, was advanced as the little champion has to leave early tomorrow.

But the police put their foot down.

“It’s not good for a four-year-old. It could be dangerous for his heart and brain. We don’t want to be a party to his running ? there has been so much opposition from several quarters,” police commissioner Ajai Kumar Singh said.

But as officers stood at the club’s gates, Budhia and the coach were seen whispering to each other. They then signalled they were ready for a short “celebrity” run around the garden.