The Nobel prize is noble

Barack Obama wins the Nobel Peace prize. It is richly deserved, after all the Nobel committee says so. Therefore, it must be fair and just that Obama got it. After all, politicians get elected on promise alone. And they needn’t merely be promises. They just need to make some sort of noises that would suggest that they are trying to look as if they are trying to do something. That ensures a presidential seat in the US, the prime-minister’s chair in India.

I do not know what the big deal is about Obama getting the peace prize. Especially, to us Indians. It was denied to Gandhi, big deal. Some may say that this makes the prize as prestigious as the Nobel look ridiculous. Well, Pratibha Patil as the President of India is no less ridiculous. We have accepted it and moved on, the same would happen with Obama.

And while we are at it, may I suggest a few more awards that fall in the league of the Obama Nobel and the Pratibha Patil presidency?

Here goes:

ICC Spirit of Cricket Award: Andrew Symonds & S Sreesanth
Best ‘Original’ music score: Pritam
Filmfare award for best performance in a lead role (Male) for 2009: Rani Mukherjee for Dil Bole Hadippa
Pulitzer prize for Fiction, 2009: Letters to Penthouse, whatever volume comes out this year
Magsaysay Award for Journalism: Shared equally by all the Bombay Times journos for cutting-edge journalism; Next year, it belongs to India TV
Bharat Ratna: Mohd. Afzal Guru; we are paying for his upkeep after he attacked the parliament, he deserves it
Oscar for best film in a foreign language: Deshdrohi
Human documentary of the year: Rakhi Ka Swayamwar
Best country to live in: Afghanistan
World’s favourite tourist destination: Baghdad

And may I add that I am forwarding my name for the Nobel Prize for medicine. After all, I have discovered that brandy and warm milk cures a cold in a jiffy.

Some dreams do come true

All good things do come to an end. I’d heard this adage many times, and I have seen it come true in ways big and small. There were times I did not realise that something wonderful would come to an end. In my naivety, I took them for granted. And when those times would come to an end, I’d realise suddenly what I have lost. At times, what I’d lost was irrevocable and the loss of it has left voids that would never be filled. The greatest grief has been the fact that I had taken those times, those people, those moments as a given. I never believed it would end.

I was away from home, staying in a different city, a carefree student. There was a phone call for me in my institute’s canteen, and I was called to attend it. I was playing table-tennis at that point of time. I walked out of the room to take the phone call, with my TT bat and the TT ball in hand. I was leading 19-12 (I remember the score clearly) and did not want anybody to take my place on the table, so I took the ball away while going to attend the phone call, and did not realise that moments later I would be told on the phone that my grand-father had left me for ever.

I do not remember what I did after I heard of it. I thought of the walks with him during my vacations, the way he would want me to study hard but play harder. But most of all, I thought of the wonderful stories he had told me, the unparalleled stories about people and life that this grand-child had heard sitting on his Dadu’s knee. He was is the greatest person I knew and never did it cross my mind that he would be taken away.

Many such great things came to an end. I finished my studies, and my days as a student came to an end. Till some time back, I stayed with my parents & my brother in the most beautiful house in the world but those days came to an end as well. Till 2006, I worshipped a sportsman more than any other and he retired.

What was common to all these ends was that there was always a new beginning. Three years after Dadu left us, Didi had a baby boy. In Rishi I saw, and still see, the everthing that is beautiful on Earth. When I left home, I formed a family with a bunch of people who had left theirs. We formed a bond for life, the kinds that I have with my folks. When my days as a student were over, I started a wonderful life as a working professional. I met new people and made some more wonderful friends for life. Along the way, I fell in love and then fell out of love to fall in and out again.

All of this made me realise that sometimes an end is a new beginning, though not always is the end linked to a new beginning. I realised that almost all voids can be filled. But even after being filled, I kept (and still keep) dreaming that I would be given back a few moments of my past. I dream of spending an afternoon with both Rishi and Dadu in tow. I keep dreaming that my house and my hostel are a 100 yards away. I dream that my friends from school, college and MBA are also working in the same organisation along with my new friends. And, I dreamt since 2006 that Schumi races again… just once.

All of my dreams were impractical and improbable, mostly impossible. Dead people don’t come to life, days gone by do not come back and inhabit with the days we are living. And sportsmen usually do not come back to active duty at the age of 40. Out of the scores of dreams, one dream has come true. Michael Schumacher will race again. I don’t know if he will race like the world beater that he was, but what I do know is that he will make me live my dream.

Once again I will wear the scarlet shirt. Once again I would wear the cap with the 7 world championship stars, once again I will say a silent prayer as Schumacher lines up at the starting grid, and once again I will scream “Go Schumi” at the top of my voice when he roars off the starting line. Maybe, I’ll also jump for joy if he wins.

And after all this is over I’ll still dream of walking in a park with my nephew in my lap. I’ll point at a rose to and say that “this is a crimson rose”, and while saying this I’ll turn to my right and tell Dadu “you remember, you told me about a crimson rose when you told me the story of The Nightingale & The Rose by Oscar Wilde?” The Schumi dream has come true so maybe this dream would also come true, just maybe……

The unlikely hero

Heroes turn up in unlikely places. They are heroes because of their deeds, not necessarily because the world (the media, primarily) talk about them, but because they make a difference. A difference to our lives, be it directly or indirectly. There emerged a hero yesterday, not for the first time, but he did emerge. This hero was responsible (as he claims) for the death of 6 people and serious injury to 15 others. I still call him a hero. Perhaps an explanation is due.

I’m talking about E Sreedharan, the Managing Director of Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC), who resigned yesterday owning moral responsibility to an accident. An under-construction bridge of the Delhi metro collapsed, killing 6 and injuring many more. The reason this gentleman resigned, and I quote him, was – “For me even one casualty is too many. My colleagues advised against the resignation. Normally I listen to them but this time it is different. I have been in-charge of the project for 10 years. We have maintained a high safety mechanism. The first jolt was the Laxmi Nagar accident but this is a bigger setback".

I had heard of Sreedharan sometime in 2007, I suppose. He was the architect of the Delhi metro. This was one of the very few government projects that had been completed efficiently and well before time, quite unlike the Bandra-Worli sea link. Of course, this was not a first for Sreedharan. He had earlier achieved the near impossible, i.e. setting up the Konkan Railways. It was believed to be impossible and he did it in 7 years. The results are there for everybody to see. As a result of that, he was thrown the challenge of giving the capital its metro service. A challenge he accepted, on the verge of retirement, and achieved with distinction.

He had kept a reverse clock in his office, while the metro project was on, to keep people on their toes to meet the deadline. He was the one who made sure that this work ethic was imbibed among all that worked in DMRC, and they worked to achieve the deadline. And quality of work was not compromised. Yes, he was a hero.

Yet, this man resigns. Perhaps, because he is truly a leader. He did not rest on his laurels, and he has many. He could have come out stating that these things, however unfortunate, do happen. Given his impeccable record most would have swallowed it. But probably, he had his conscience to answer to, and that made him take the step he has taken.

I cast my mind back to the security lapses that have happened in India in the recent past. The last being the 26/11 incident. Shivraj Patil, with already a lot of blood in his hands, never resigned. He was sacked. The same with Vilasrao Deshmukh. The latter, though, has been rewarded with a minister-ship for failing in his primary duty as Chief Minister; that of protecting his citizens. The list of politicians is endless, who have failed miserably over a long period of time. Yet, they have no moral fibre that would make them own up a failure. Though they are responsible, they point fingers at others but hold on to their exalted positions. The never resign, but shamelessly stand for elections again.

But Sreedharan is different. In the past, he has given us a lot to be happy about. He has helped us save time, he has made distances disappear, made travelling a joy. Not just for us, but for the generations to follow. Yet, he could not take this lapse. It is an irony that a man this just and efficient and upright reports to a politician, the Chief Minister of Delhi.

He has taught us a lesson. He has taught us that we are just as good as our last performance, and not our past laurels. That there is a moral dimension to everything. What Sreedharan has done reminds me of a saying about a waterfall I read some time back – falling down from a somewhere so high has never looked as graceful or glorious. Well, Sreedharan has decided to fall with dignity. I guess this does make him an even greater hero.

There was a winner, and I didn't see a loser

Sport teaches. It enriches. And this isn’t restricted just to the people who play it, this extends to the people who watch as well, in fact the followers learn more. As I watched yesterday’s Wimbledon men’s singles epic final culminate to Federer lifting his 15th Grand Slam, a message was re-emphasised to me. The message was that in sport there is always a victor and a runner-up, but never a loser. This is not shown by a way a sportsman plays, but by the way the sportsman behaves after ending 2nd best. That is what Andy Roddick showed yesterday.

Roddick was the better player in the final, who never looked like his serve would be broken. Well, Federer won because he knows what it takes to be a champion, that he needs to stick around. He won because he hung on, because he refused to be a runner-up, because the grabbed the slightest opening (the only one in the whole match) that came his way. He did not win because he was the better player, for that was Roddick.

I cast my mind back to 2006. Michael Schumacher was racing like a dream, in Japan. It was his last season and he was fighting Alonso for the title. More than any of his fans he wanted to sign off as a world champion, for Michael Schumacher could never accept defeat. Then the unthinkable happened. His reliable Ferrari engine blew, with Schumacher leading the race, and with the engine went his chances of ending as a world champion. He’d never ever regain it. I thought that I’d see Schumacher walk out of the car disappointed, dejected, and walk into the Ferrari garage. After all, for no fault of his a championship, that was his for the taking, had gone away.

But there was a different script being written. Schumacher stepped out of his car, had a smile on his face. I don’t know what emotion hid behind it, but he was waving to the crowds as he walked back to the Ferrari pit, saying goodbye and thanking people. The Ferrari pit was a picture of dejection. The engineers and crew were heartbroken, because they had let Schumacher down at such a crucial juncture. But Schumi walked up to every one of them with a smile and hugged them all, consoling them. It seemed that he told them ‘forget about today, what you have done over the last 6 years is immeasurable. What happened today is a part of sport’.

As I saw that bit of magic unfold, this heartbroken fan learnt a lesson. That I should thank Schumacher for winning 7 championships and 91 races and not feel bad because he’s lost this one. The heart did not seem that broken then. I saw on screen a man who didn’t win, but who by no means was a loser.

A bit of that magic unfolded on Wimbledon’s centre court yesterday. Roger Federer walked all over centre court, carrying his trophy. In his corner, quietly sat the valiant Roddick. Teary eyed, with the runners-up plate, wondering what went wrong, but there was a difference. With those teary eyes he was looking at Federer parade and Roddick was giving his conqueror the most generous applause. It was genuine, it was dignified, it was tragic, and it was magical. He wasn’t moping and grumpy. He took his defeat like a sportsman. He lost to a man who did not play better tennis than him, but that did not stop Roddick from applauding one of the greatest feats in modern day tennis, 15 grand slams.

Maybe, Roddick’s day in the sun will come. Perhaps he would be a champion one day. He taught me the old lesson sport has been teaching me since forever, that why a defeated sportsman is not a loser. Maybe, he's a champion already...

Greg Chappell, lies and cover-ups

When will it ever end? These rabid comments by that abject failure of a coach, Greg Chappell, is what I am referring to. In his latest salvo, Chappell has said that he was the victim of a racist attack. The former failed coach has also said in an under-arm, oops! Sorry, below the belt attack that the BCCI had suppressed the whole story by the BCCI where the media was led to believe that it was a push in the back. Saint Greg has also said that the attack wasn’t on any Indian cricket player and he wasn’t a selector (who kept players out), so the attack can be deemed to be racist.

What a liar! Of the many things that we are proud of in India, one of them is that we have a free press. Sitting at our homes, we got the news that Greg Chappell was ATTACKED by a lunatic because the latter felt that Chappell kept out players from his state. Nobody, and I mean NOBODY, was happy with what happened to Greg Chappell. And the Indian media is not stupid or foolish to swallow whatever the BCCI feeds it. The lunatic is cooling his heels in prison now.

Coming back to Chappell, does he forget the way his middle-finger salute at Calcutta was tried to be covered up by the media manager of the BCCI? Nobody in the media fell for the futile attempt for a cover-up when the manager said ‘Chappell had injured his finger during the team’s practice and was showing it to a team-mate’. The same BCCI that Chappell accuses tried to cover-up in vain for a stupid act by the coach of the national team. He should have been thrown out of the job then and there.

There were so many more instances of the BCCI trying to cover-up for Chappell. Two of them come to mind straight away: 1) When Chappell said that the parliamentarians were paid to hurl accusations at the coach because the team was losing; 2) When he said that Sourav Ganguly was the captain because it was important to his finances. As the recent past would show, when the Indian ambassador to the US, Ronen Sen, called the parliamentarians headless chickens, he landed in a soup. Chappell went scot-free despite hurling these baseless accusations, he was saved by the same BCCI that he accuses today. In both the aforesaid cases the BCCI tried to cover up and the media reported the cover-ups with smirks and sarcasm.

If the victim Greg Chappell is so disheartened by this nation of racists, why is it that he has come back to this country? Why has he landed himself a job with Rajasthan Cricket Academy? The person who gave him this job is Lalit Modi, the Vice-President of BCCI. Why is he employed with somebody party to a cover-up? Whatever documentary Chappell comes out with, he needs to realize that he was an abject failure as a coach and he conducted himself miserably. And one is so prone to hearing lies from this person, that it is hard to believe that he is speaking the truth this time around.

The soap opera of appointments and rejections in Indian Cricket

When the news of Anil Kumble being appointed captain came in, it seemed like this old warrior has been given his due and has been given it very late in his career. There are two things that make one a little uneasy about this decision; firstly, that he has been given the job for three tests only against Pakistan and, secondly, Kumble was given this responsibility only after Sachin Tendulkar refused.

It is never easy to produce miracles in 3 matches. The last thing a national team needs is instability at the top. India does not have a coach and if one does not know who will captain the team against the best team in the world, it does not augur well for a national team. Yes, there have been reports, and Kumble has himself said in an interview that he thinks that he is not a stop-gap captain, but the plain fact is that Anil Kumble has been appointed for 3 test matches only. One does not know if Jumbo has been informally told that the appointment is till the Springboks visit India, but if he has been(that is what some media reports claim) why couldn’t the selectors and the board make it official that he is the skipper for three full series and not just three tests?

Very few things that the selectors and the board have done have been right. I just simply cannot understand these short term announcements. Appoint teams for 2 games, appoint captains for 3 tests or one series. It would be a jolly good idea to appoint selectors for 2 games and based on the performance of the selected players the selectors’ would be retained. I know that it is a preposterous idea, but that is the very same theory that the selectors seem to be following as far as team selection goes. And I do not understand why the selectors give in to media rhetoric.

Each and every time the team is about to be selected, and that is almost thrice a month these days, one wonders about what would the future of the senior batsmen be. But our batting does not seem to be the problem and certainly not the three seniors that have been targeted, but the bowlers. To elucidate, if one were to look at the Australia series and this series against Pakistan, whenever India has bowled 50 overs, they have conceded runs at the rate of 8.83 in the last 10 overs. That has usually been the difference in winning and losing. If the opposing team scores close to ninety runs in the last ten, it leaves the batsmen with a mountain to climb while chasing or it becomes extremely difficult to defend what the batsmen have put up.

Does this small fact not irk the selectors? Especially when we have a bowling coach? Somehow, the media is obsessed with big names. The selectors have needlessly fallen prey to the rhetoric. They have dropped Rahul Dravid needlessly just because he did not fare well against Australia (he has scored 823 runs at 37.4 in 31 ODIs in 2007). The other two batsmen that are being placed under needless scrutiny are Sachin Tendulkar (who has scored 1298 runs in 31 ODIs in 2007 at an average of 46.35) and Sourav Ganguly (who has scored 1235 runs in 31 ODIs at 45.74). The two Indian openers are numbers 2 and 3 in the highest scorers’ list in 2007. And in the top 10 run getters of 2007 there are 4 Indians and three of them in the top 4. The problem is clearly not our batting.

But then the selectors have only been giving in to rhetoric. They are trying to fix something that isn’t broken. And the thing that is mutilated is not been looked into at all. There are 3 things that need to be fixed in Indian cricket. 1) Give the captain a long rope; 2) Don’t touch the batting till the South Africa series gets over and fix the bowling quickly; 3) Get the board mandarins and the selectors to shut up and work for Indian cricket, and not try their best to give the media stories, get their faces on the tele and their columns in the papers.

Kimi Raikkonen was the only deserving winner. Not Lewis Hamilton, nor Fernando Alonso

Everbody has said, and quite rightly, that Kimi Raikkonen is the deserving world champion in 2007. I totally agree. Where I disagree entirely is when one says Lewis Hamilton would have been an equally deserving world champion. Kimi did not only have to fight Hamilton and Fernando Alonso, he also had to fight the FIA that looked like it was trying its best to ensure that Hamilton wins. Let me explain in greater detail.

Cast your minds back to the European GP. Hamilton beached his car in the rains. He was crane-lifted back on to the track so that he could resume racing and score some points. This was absolutely uncalled for. Did this not seem to be some sort of favouritism in favour of the new-comer?

Let’s move to Monza now, the Italian GP. He overtakes Felipe Massa on Lap 1, turn 1 by cutting the chicane. But the stewards and the FIA decide to look the other way. Had any other driver cut chicanes they would have been put under scrutiny, but with Hamilton it seemed like Caesar’s wife is beyond suspicion. He can do whatever he wants on a race-track.

More recently, at Interlagos, during the first free-practice session. Hamilton, Honda's Jenson Button, and Super Aguri's Takuma Sato were deemed to have used two sets of wet weather tyres during the first free practice session at Interlagos, in breach of the Sporting Regulations. Article 25.3 of the F1 Sporting Regulations states: "No driver may use more than one set of wet and one set of extreme weather tyres during P1 and P2." There was no grid penalty for the Golden Boy, he was fined $15,000. There was no way the FIA would ruin his chances of winning the championship. Moral of the story? If you want to break the rules, break them with Hamilton to ensure no penalties.

Now, for the Japanese Grand Prix. Hamilton comes up with a beautiful and novel way of keeping his tyres warm. He might not have done it intentionally, but he did something that could have ruined some other drivers’ race. It was a mistake for which he should have been penalized. After all, other drivers have been penalized for making the same mistake. But no penalties for Hamilton.

How would this person have been a deserving world champion? Another big reason why neither Hamilton, nor Alonso should have been allowed to compete for the world drivers’ championship was that they both gained unfair advantage over the other drivers because of what McLaren was involved in. Because McLaren cheated for an advantage, they were docked off all the constructors’ points. Why not the drivers too? If I were to use this yardstick in cricket, this thing’s equivalent would have been had the South African players been allowed to play international cricket for their individual records when the country had been banned from cricket due to apartheid.

It is poetic justice that the deserving driver, Kimi Raikkonen won the championship. And it is poetic justice that Ferrari won the constructors’ championship. They would have won it even if McLaren would have been allowed to compete. Let me explain how. Ferrari got 204 points (Kimi 110 + Massa 94) and McLaren would have had 203 points. Hamilton 109 + Alonso 109 = 218; minus the 15 points that were stripped off McLaren for the Hungarian GP qualifying fiasco, that would bring McLaren’s score at 203 after the Brazilian GP, one point lesser than Ferrari.

The only deserving team and the only deserving driver won the titles. Neither McLaren, nor Lewis Hamilton, nor Fernando Alonso deserved anything this season.