Diego Maradona fan in southern India builds gold statue for Argentina legend, to fly to Qatar for FIFA World Cup
by Surya PrakashBoby Chemmanur, a gold trader based in southern India’s Kerala, has made the headlines for getting a golden statue made to commemorate Diego Maradona’s iconic, ‘Hand of God’ moment and he plans on travelling to Qatar with it and watching the ongoing FIFA World Cup.
The gold statue is of that memorable moment where the Argentina legend scored with his hand against England in the 1986 World Cup.
Visuals showed the 5.5 feet-high structure which had the pose of that goal. The ball in this statue along with Maradona’s leg were made of gold. According to a report, Chemmanur will be travelling 812 kms in western India’s Goa, Mumbai and southern India’s Karnataka before jetting off to Qatar for watching the FIFA World Cup. He had started his journey from Trivandrum in southern India’s Kerala, on November 21.
And he plans to travel on this tour with the statue in an open-topped vehicle. The reason for this tour is to spread Maradona’s message-‘football addiction against drug addiction’ and inspire people to not use drugs. An avid football fan, Chemmanur went to two colleges in Kochi on November 24 where he made students pledge against the use of drugs.
According to him, Maradona was supposed to launch this campaign but that didn’t happen with the sudden demise of one of the icons of the sport.
Besides spreading the message against the use of drugs, Chemmanur also launched a project to inspire the students with the goal of India playing the next World Cup.
Recalling a conversation with Maradona, Chemmanur revealed the reason behind the statue. He said that he had wanted to gift a golden ball to Maradona but the football legend instead asked him to make a statue with his ‘Hand of God’ moment.
The gold trader will travel to Qatar with this statue where it will be displayed in several stadiums. The structure would then be handed over to a popular museum in Qatar.