BCCI takes popular decisons, not the right ones!

Two days have gone by since the BCCI met up to discuss the future of Indian cricket। One thought that probably this would result in some forward steps for the sport in India. Sadly, the major decisions taken are contrary to the same. Well, I shall try and list them down one by one.

1) There is to be a cap on endorsements: Players cannot do more than 3 endorsements. Which genius arrived at the number of 3, and what are the reasons that the cap has been set to 3? This decision has been taken purely because many people watching cricket and large sections of the media have been insinuating that the cricketers’ means of livelihood should be strangled. In my previous article I had written at length about the public and the board having nothing to do between a contract between a player and a company.

2) Sachin Tendulkar and Yuvraj Singh have been sent notices: Well, the board has hauled up two cricketers who have given their lives to cricket because they wanted to clear the air about accusations flung at them by a pig-headed coach. Why didn’t the BCCI give showcause notices to Chappell when he (a) Showed his middle-finger to some Indian supporters (they hushed it up saying that he had injured a finger) ;(b) When Chappell gave an interview to the Guardian saying that the former Indian cricketer wanted to stay in the hot seat because of the money; (c) when Chappell had made it a habit to leak team plans and his thoughts on selection to his subservient legion in the press; (d) When he started leaking like a sieve on cricketers after the world cup debacle. Why hasn’t the BCCI issued a show cause notice to all the board mandarins who have been giving sound bytes to the media even before an important meeting was held?

3) We hear no commitment on the number of days an Indian cricketer plays: Why haven’t the BCCI given blueprints on the maximum number of days that Indian cricketers will play per year? We play too much cricket, especially one-day cricket, and that needs to be stopped. Why doesn’t the board say that these are the maximum number of matches that the team will play per year?

The board seems to have misread the whole thing very badly. They need to realize that the players don’t exist because there’s the board but we have a BCCI because of the players. The points on endorsements and on the notices to players will have a serious effect on the players’ morale. By all means, have performance related contracts. This is a very good step, in the right direction. Apart from the appointment of specialized coaches and Shastri’s appointment as manager, and the performance graded contracts. But to rap the players on their knuckles so badly, because of two defeats is really in very bad taste. Bangladesh just beat South Africa, the No. 1 team in the world, so Indians losing to them is actually no disgrace. For God’s sake, the Bangladeshis played better cricket than we did. Why is that so hard to digest?

There are decisions that are taken, some are popular decisions and some are right decisions. Unfortunately, board has taken popular decisions. Banning endorsements would be very popular among those so-called fans that are baying for blood. But this is not a right decision. We need to look at things objectively. The board needs to have performance-related contracts, appoint a CEO who’d be accountable and responsible, ensure player welfare by seeing that they don’t play too much cricket, appoint a full-time media manager, and give specific timelines by which the selection process would be overhauled.

What does the board do instead? Needlessly give in to incorrect opinion and thereby wrongly punish those who have given their sweat, blood and emotion for the Indian flag, and taken pride in representing their motherland, for 2 days where another team happened to play better cricket. What a shame! Or should I say, What a Sham!! That’s what the administration and sections of the media are, at the moment.

The Fair-weather fan

There are some ridiculous comments doing the rounds these days in India, about the Indian cricket team. Sack the players! Kick out the over 30s! And the most ridiculous of the lot – ‘Ban these cricketers from endorsing products!’ & ‘Don’t pay them their match fees”. While all the aforesaid comments don’t make too much sense, the ones that are the most ridiculous of them all are the last two comments.

Cricketers are marketable properties. If we see their ads 25 times a day, doesn’t mean that they had been shooting for those ads for 25 days. Its outright stupid to assume anything of that sort. They are multi-millionaires, but that is because of their own abilities. What the cricket lovers (what a loosely used term!) in India need to know for a fact is that none of us, yes, none of us, are paying the cricketers their salaries out of our own pockets, so who are we to question their salaries?

Why is it that the people, propelled by the media, are so angry with the team? Yes, they didn’t play well. But the cricketers are not on top of the world themselves after such an insipid performance. If we put things in perspective, they played one bad match against Bangladesh that cost us the Super 8. How come nobody is complimenting the Bangladeshis for a fantastic performance? And the Sri Lankans too? Did the team promise to come back with the world cup? Did they ask the media to run tickers, take signature campaigns, launch special programs to get more viewers? NO!! The answer is an outright, NO! Just because they played one bad match we seem have gotten a right to stop them from earning. If a surgeon cannot cure a patient, and the patient dies, does he/she still not get paid? That is a matter of life and death, and cricket is just a game.

Come to think of it, we hardly pay to watch a cricket match. It’s broadcast on a channel, out of the 100s that are beamed to our homes for which we pay 250 bucks a month. The cricketers never ever asked us to watch them play by switching to the channel that’s carrying the cricket broadcast. The endorsements that they signed were between the company and the cricketer. What the hell are the media doing, running stories and asking ignorant fools on whether they should stop doing endorsements? Nobody knows it better than a cricketer that if the performance dries up, so will the money. Let’s leave it at that.

The meaning of a fan should change. A fan, these days, stands for fair-weather friends. Where are the fans supporting the team when it’s down in the dumps? These are the times when the team needs its fans, but they are nowhere to be found. Maybe, this team didn’t deserve the world cup. But do we, the fans, deserve the cup? Well, we got what we deserved. A first round exit is just what fair weather friends deserve.

We have a right to be angry with the team, but in a civilized way. Not by wrecking their houses, endangering their young families, and certainly not by demanding that they should stop doing ads and not get salaries. Spare a thought for guys like Sachin, Kumble Sourav and Dravid. They have represented their nation with pride, had glittering careers, but do not have a world cup to show for their efforts of more than a decade’s representation. This was the last world cup for all of them. To crash out of it, the way they did, didn’t cause us a fraction of the pain it caused them. So let some sense prevail in the Indian fans and the Indian media.

The Cricket Experts Start Commenting Again....

Ah, the joys of being an expert! As far as India is concerned, anybody who has played a little bit of international cricket qualifies as one.

The powers-that-be in the Indian media don’t care if the experts understand the sport at all. There is a big difference between playing the game and actually understanding it -- and the same jokers who proclaimed that this was a wonderful Indian team are now castigating the World Cup failures.

It’s so easy when one has the benefit of ‘hindsight.' Bishen Bedi and Kapil Dev were proved wrong. The former said that minnows don’t deserve to be in the World Cup and the latter proclaimed that India were a fantastic team. Nobody has forgotten how Kapil dragged himself in the team from 1991-94 to get 31 wickets. And that bloke talks about the Indian team’s commitment, weeks after he said that this was a very good side.

He ceased being Kapil and became a mere statistic when he plodded around needlessly to achieve that personal milestone; and his comments don’t matter much these days because everybody knows about his commitment for the country between 1991 and 1994.

And now we come to Sunil Gavaskar. He is the only person who had said from the very beginning that Greg Chappell’s appointment would be disastrous for the team. Well, he didn’t have the benefit of hindsight, but he’s been proven right. Come to think of it, Chappell was not a success when he was coach of a local Australian side.

Coming back to the experts here -- Kris Srikkanth, Madan Lal, Atul Wassan, please, enough! Srikkanth had a wonderful average of 29 in both forms of the game, and he has the cheek to talk big. Madan Lal got around 70 Test wickets with a mind-boggling average of 40 runs per wicket. Atul Wassan has a staggering 21 international wickets. And they talk about the changes that should happen in Indian cricket. All of them talk with the benefit of hindsight and none of them have the guts to serve as selectors or talent scouts or coaches.

It's time to bring in some real experts who know this wonderful game. Peter Roebuck, Harsha Bhogle, Vijay Lokapally, these are the people that matter. They are the real experts, they have covered this beautiful game for decades. When people ask, ‘How many international matches have they played?’, they need to know that one doesn’t need to be a good cook to understand good cooking. Indian cricket needs to change, but not on the lines of what these dime-a-dozen experts talk about.

Missing the woods for the trees... Gavaskar Vs Ponting

We are all missing the whole point. Tempers have flared, egos have been hurt and a lot of unnecessary talk has happened between a yesterday great and a modern day great, Gavaskar and Ponting. While the latest salvo from Gavaskar, on the death of David Hookes’ death was uncalled for, what amazes me more is how conveniently we have ignored, or chosen to ignore, the remarks that Ricky Ponting made.

The issue at hand was not ‘who is the champion team’. The issue was more to do with ‘how do cricketers conduct themselves on the field’. A very recent article on www.Sportingo.com made me wonder a little. There were two parts to it. Firstly, the writer talked about the Aussies having a more colourful language in their culture ; and, secondly, about the Aussies losing to England in 2005 because of their seemingly good behavior. Before I discuss these points in detail, let me add that this is nothing personal against the writer, whose articles are always informative and extremely well written.

A colourful culture does not mean that they get a license to abuse on the ground. Look at the way the Aussie players and crowds have behaved in the past. Here are a few examples:

1) Darren Lehman, on being dismissed, refers to the Sri Lankans as ‘Black C****s’.

2) Dean Jones called Hashim Amla a terrorist on air.

3) Aussie crowds haul racist abuse at the South African players.

The list, if one may go on, is extremely large, and colourful. I am no expert in the Australian culture, but I don’t think that any culture encourages people to pass racist abuse, and that too at sportsmen. And, I don’t think that Australia lost to England in 2005 because they were good blokes. The fact is that England had an in-form pace attack, and batsmen in form. Australia had McGrath unavailable for 2 crucial matches, Gillespie was woefully out of form, as was Michael Clarke and a few more Aussies. For once, can’t we all admit that England played better cricket? Did Australia lose to the Kiwis 3-0 recently because they were good blokes there too?

Now for what Gavaskar said and what Ponting retaliated about. Just like Gavaskar had no business bringing David Hookes into the whole issue, Ponting had no business talking of India’s record. In sport winning counts but what also counts is the manner in which teams conduct themselves. What Gavaskar talked about was simply the latter. Why have writers and commentators all over missed out on the fact that Ponting talked rubbish by dragging records into the fray and personally attacking Gavaskar, when that was not the point at all? Agreed, Gavaskar is not the epitome of good manners himself, but the point he was making isn’t incorrect.

People who read this column, please ask yourselves this question. When we read reports of the Aussie crowds showering racist abuse at players, what do we think? Do we think that ‘no, these are just a few lunatics (which is what the fact is)’ or do we incorrectly generalize by thinking ‘well, look at how their team behaves. Its no surprise that the crowds behave like that, that’s how all Aussies are’.

While cricketers have a duty to win for their nation each time they step on the field, they have a duty to behave themselves because they are ambassadors of their countries. Sadly, Gavaskar at times used to forget the same in his playing career (as was demonstrated at Melbourne, 1981), but Ponting probably doesn’t even know that they are supposed to be ambassadors of Australia and that they need to behave. Or else, he’d have thought again and asked his team to behave or, at least, behaved himself.

Minnows in the cricket world cup

A lot has been said about the so-called minnows participating in the world cup. Eight of them. Here’s my take on them participating in the World Cup and why I feel they should. A lot of people, including the former India captain Bishen Singh Bedi (the guy who declared the side’s innings because he was scared that he might get injured), have said that it lowers the standards down. Well, if they weren’t to play the big boys of international cricket, how would they ever learn? I don’t think any cricket board would organize official or unofficial tours with the full-strength national teams against teams like Bermuda or Canada.

It’s up to the ICC to ensure that they play some international cricket, and why not the world cup? It would help the bigger teams to acclimatize, and give the minnows some exposure to the rigours of international cricket. The recent defeat of the Kiwis in the hands of the Bangladeshis proves that there are some very capable teams who can beat the big boys on their day.

Bedi also says that ‘India is not allowed to play in the football world cup, so why allow these minnows to play in the cricket world cup’? Well, the informed cricketer probably missed out on one small fact that football is being played in nearly 150 countries. They cannot have a world cup that has all of them playing, and hence, have a qualifying system whereby 32 teams qualify and participate. But there are probably just about 25 countries playing cricket, and if cricket is to become a mass sport, the smaller teams should play the big guys.

I am not for one moment suggesting that all that the ICC is doing is right. Getting the smaller teams to play only the world cup and then not helping them to play any further is criminal. The world cup is just the beginning. After the WC, the ICC should ensure that the small teams get at least 2 home and away tours with a major test playing nation. Also, there should be regular tours of the A-teams of the test playing nations to these smaller countries. There needs to be a serious step taken to ensure that these smaller countries get the right infrastructure that enables them to raise their standards.

A beginning needs to be made somewhere. If that means the World Cup, so be it. I so wonder where do these cricket pundits go when it comes to developing sport in these smaller countries? Why don’t they go ahead and help in developing the sport in these nations? They talk big of giving back to the game what the game has given them, but all they mean by it is that they’ll mane asinine comments on the game and want to get paid big bucks for the same. Sandeep Patil showed the way, when he took up the job of coaching Kenya. As far as I remember, those minnows made it to the Semi-finals of the previous world cup. But does Mr. Bedi remember?

It’s so easy to sit on the other side of the fence and criticize the happenings, but how many of the former cricketers would want to get their hands dirty and develop a team? They’d want to get tons of money to criticize the ICC and everything else, but when it comes to real work they back out. And most of the comments that these former cricketers make only proves that there is a big difference between playing international cricket and in actually understanding it. God save the fan, who is fed all this daily.

MPs and Greg Chappell ..... In Defence of our MPs

Yet again the focus has shifted away from the playing field. We see a pig-headed coach saying rubbish about the politicians of India, or, more specifically, the members of Parliament. There are a couple of things that astound me out here. One being Chappell’s fetish with money; and, second, the reactions of sections of the fans and the sections of the media. I shall try and tackle them one by one.

Firstly, Greg Chappell. He was a fantastic batsman and a wonderful captain. It is a fact that he is a very lousy coach. Forget the results, we don’t look like competing in any match. Some time back, he had said that Ganguly wanted to stay in the team, and as a captain, for money. Now, he says that MPs are ‘PAID’ to decry him. There is one thing that he must realize. For most Indians, cricket is a passion. We watch the team play because of the tri-colour and insipid performances on the field. It does not matter to us how much is a player or a coach paid, as long as they play well. And we Indians don’t need to be PAID to cheer our team and criticize them.

The second, and more important issue, is the reaction that I see by sections of the media and fans. They say that politicians should shut up about cricket, they anyways don’t run the country well, so on and so forth. I humbly ask, if politicians opining about cricket is so damn pathetic, why is a respected politician the head of BCCI? India is not the only country where politicians have taken interest in the most popular sport of the country. Agreed, they fair miserably on the jobs that they are actually supposed to do, but that does not mean that they cannot raise an issue that the whole country is talking about.

At least the politicians of our country are lamenting the fact that our team is not winning matches. Go back a few years, and the prime minister of Australia had called Muralitharan a chucker. He holds the highest office and had the cheek to make a comment on one of the greatest bowlers of all time, and the remark was uncalled for. There is a governing body in cricket that looks at issues like chucking and he actually made a statement on what he believed was right. At least our MPs, however bad they might be, have been lamenting the fact that our team has been performing pathetically. It is surprising that why are sections of the media covering up for Greg.

As fans, we have a right to expect our team to perform brilliantly on the field. The fact that the team is not doing well is something that the coach should accept and rectify. I read that ‘the coach can’t bat or bowl or field, the players have to do that and hence they should be blamed and not the coach’. Well, if everything is to be done by the players, then why have a coach at all?

Geet Sethi - The song we forgot to sing

There are things that are surreal and then there are things that are beyond explanation. Let me tell you the surreal bit first. There exists an Indian sportsman who has been winning world titles since the early nineties. This sportsman has won the highest number of world championships in the world, in his discipline. He won his first world title in his twenties and then won his eighth title at the ripe old age of 43. He has set world records galore. He is also an Asian games gold medalist for India. This surreal phenomenon’s name is Geet Sethi.

Now for something that is beyond explanation. A country that starves for its sportsmen to succeed does not bother to felicitate the greatest and winningest (pardon the incorrect English) sportsman it has ever produced. A man who has been bringing glory to his sport for nearly two decades. A man who is India’s best hope of winning a championship, when he is nearing an age when the candles on his birthday cake might cost more than the cake itself. How conveniently have we forgotten, or chosen to ignore, Geet Sethi.

People probably would say that Geet Sethi is not the greatest sportsman that India has produced. How many people know him? How many people know Billiards? Tendulkar or Kapil Dev or Sunil Gavaskar should have that honour. I have a few points to make here. The first is the fact that people do not know of billiards is not Geet’s fault. It takes an equal amount of hard work and practice to be a champion, be it in cricket, shooting, tennis or billiards. And the greatest sportsman of the country can never be decided by consensus, as that weighs way too much towards the most popular sport in the country.

The second point is that most people of our generation know billiards because of Geet Sethi. Sachin or Kapil, had they not played cricket people would still have been crazy about it. Players like Geet Sethi have had an impact on the sport they play in for years. Sethi’s impact has been felt for nearly two decades. I can safely say that had Geet Sethi decided to be a corporate executive, people after Michael Ferreira’s era would not have known anything about billiards, and unless Pankaj Advani comes up in a big way the generation after ours wouldn’t talk of it either. Lance Armstrong, Michael Schumacher, Chilly Rathore and Geet Sethi have made their discipline popular; they are synonymous with the sport they play. Does anybody bother to know whose record did Lance Armstrong beat to be the highest winner of the Tour de France? The absence of Sachin does not make cricket any less popular, Dhoni and Pathan would do, but Geet’s absence might kill billiards in India.

Thirdly, Geet Sethi is probably the only champion to have come out of India. He is the only person who has won eight world titles. Kapil’s Devils won India a world cup, Geet Sethi won India a gold medal in the Asian Games, and more countries participate there than in a cricket World Cup. Add to that the fact that he has world records for the highest break in the cue sport.

But the thing that makes Geet Sethi the greatest sportsman in my mind is the fact that he has done so much for the sport. I think it was 1997 when Gold Flake decided to stop sponsoring the billiards world championship and due to lack of sponsorship the event couldn’t be played that year. Come 1998, Geet Sethi roped in a sponsor, Florsheim, and organized the world championship in Ahmedabad single-handedly. By the way, he also won the championship beating the then world champion Mike Russell.

One can keep writing about the great man. But today, a week after he has won his 8^th world title I very humbly ask: isn’t Geet Sethi a champion we should have celebrated? We, the citizens of a country thirsty for sporting successes? Shouldn’t the media talk more about him? We should have been singing paens, celebrating this hero. But alas, Geet Sethi is a song we have all chosen to forget. Sorry, Geet!

Aamir's concerned about NBA? Yeah!! Right!!!!!

I don't know if the word hypocrite does justice to a person like Aamir Khan. The issue isn't about whether some star should put her or his weight behind the displaced poor in the Narmada valley, it never was. The real question is that do the people, like Aamir Khan, walk the talk?

Let's look at Aamir Khan the person. I am a huge fan of the actor. He is second to none. So, this great actor is now doing on TV what he does best! Acting. Let's go back a few years.

Aamir had shunned press because he felt they weren't good to him, in not as many words. I have issues with some sections of the press who report unworthy things such as the news.

But good journalists exist, so do good newspapers and also good news channels. What the great actor had done is shunned them for good. He refused to talk to them because they wouldn't write good things about him.

Now, Aamir Khann has movies lined up for release. He needs to promote those movies and badly needs the press, the 'demons'. The people he abhors and had refused to speak to.

If he were to go to these people say "I want to talk about Rang De... or Fanaa", we all know what the response would have been. He wouldn’t apologise. So what does he do? Make a smokescreen.

Tell the press that I want to support an issue. He may not care two hoots about the issues, but he needs to be seen so that the press says 'Aamir khan spoke about the NBA people. By the way, his movie is due for a May release, the promos have started appearing. That's exactly what he wanted and that's exactly what he has done.

He started supporting Khushboo before Rang De... released and to every question by the youth he brought up Rang De Basanti.

Now's the time for Fanaa and he wants to empathise with the displaced villagers from a room in a 5-star hotel in Delhi.

He never followed up about Khushboo? He has said that he may not be able to give NBA his full support. That means, once the movie has hit the screens he’ll show everybody the middle finger and go into his shell.

Then would be his new film's release in the near future and he'd look for an issue.

He says he was driving in Delhi and saw these people and then wanted to join them and raise the issue after spending one day (what a long time) to understand their problems.

Thank god he wasn't in Kolkata. He’d have seen a few people oppose Sourav’s exclusion from the team and then started batting for the southpaw. And had he been in Jodhpur he might have sided with the Bishnois or, god forbid, Salman killer Khan.

I don’t understand!! Is the media so naïve as to not understand the motives of this crusader by convenience? Celebrities like Rahul Bose have shown the way.

He has been helping in the Andamans even after we seem to have forgotten about the Tsunami. Highlight his efforts. Highlight the efforts of Valmik Thapar who has been fighting for our national animal for 30 years.

Fight for Medha Patkar who has always fought for the rights of the poor in the NBA.

People like Aamir Khan don’t deserve to be heard if they have vested personal interests like being seen while his latest release’s promos have come on air.

Commonwealth Games, Dawood's Party, what's the difference?

I firmly believe that Mallika Sherawat should have been the mascot for the Delhi Commonwealth Games, 2010. What all TV channels were raving about as a spectacle that has ignited high hopes for Delhi was nothing different from a movie awards night. People who have nothing to do with sport graced Melbourne. Who the hell is Aishwarya Rai? Rani Mukherji looks like an overweight belle and the only sport Saif Ali Khan has been reported to indulge in is SHIKAR. People were talking about Kapil Dev, Sunny Gavaskar, Ajit Pal Singh, Prakash Padukone and Michael Ferreira but the only people I saw were Priyanka Chopra and Lara Dutta, and a few glimpses of Vijay Amritraj.

But we don’t need these bollywood clowns dancing. They do not represent what India is all about. I have never seen film stars dance at any Olympic Games or Commonwealth games outside India. Singers? Yes. Theme songs should be sung. Have you ever seen even Tom Cruise perform> Which Hollywood actor danced when the US staged the Olympics and the FIFA World Cup? But when the Olympic torch was brought to India, Bipasha Basu carried it. PT Usha was not even invited to do the honours. Has a sportsman ever been asked to perform in their farcical awards function?

During the 1996 world cup opening ceremony at Eden Gardens we saw Saeed Jaffery address the English team as Zimbabwe and many more such bloopers. What a ham that guy is!! I thought others would realize from then on and keep these people out of sport. But, alas!!

The bollywood stars would never say no to all these. They work if they are paid. They care 2 hoots about India’s honour. None of them would have done this for free. But at the end of the day they are nautankiwalas and nautankiwaalis. It’s all about buying them. Be it LN Mittal’s daughter’s wedding or an awards function or a Commonwealth Games ceremony, or Dawood’s party, pay them and you can buy them, to sing and dance. I can only thank the heavens that at least the singers were good. But hold your horses, come 2010 and you might even hear Himesh Reshmiya’s nose singing.

That’s why I felt that in a mujra like this, it’d have been apt if Mallika Sherawat were to be the mascot for the Delhi Commonwealth Games, 2010.

And so many news channels, I did not hear even one of them castigate this! Bloody shame!

Is it fair?

I have no bloody clue. I am dazed. LN Mittal? Well, I once happened to read a column that wrote about the return of a prodigal son. The story, as it goes, is about a farmer. He has two sons who he managed to bring up with a lot of difficulty and happiness. The older son, one fine day, left home to earn somewhere and lead a life more comfortable than what he’d have at the village by tilling his fields. The father was shocked and shattered. The younger son held the family together. He toiled in the fields. He worked hard so that his old parents live comfortably. He provided. Food, comfort, peace of mind for years. He felt he needed to fulfill his duties as a son because he owed so much to the ones who brought him up.

One morning, the prodigal son returned. Was it because he became unwanted somewhere or he now needed his family after deserting them for years? Nobody knew. The father, who was longing to see his son for years - the son who went to lands afar without even telling anybody – was thrilled to have the prodigal child back. Amidst tears of joy he hugged his son and said it was no nice to have him back. Now the family is complete again. That night he called the whole village for a feast to share this happiest moment in life with them, his son had returned.

In one remote corner stood the younger son. He kept wondering – “I could have left my old parents in the lurch to seek comforts for myself in lands new, probably greener, but I stayed back and did my duty. I was never acknowledged and never did seek it. What is my fault that my father has forgotten me?”

The same is the story of a LN Mittal and his bid to take over Arcelor. He is an NRI. He has employed very few Indians. He has made himself a fortune, living in England. He buys steel companies abroad and makes even more money by his amazing business acumen. He now wants to buy a French company that, probably, in no way would help India or Indians. Why do we need to highlight this prodigal tycoon’s business ventures so much? Dr. Manmohan Singh also brought this up with Jacques Chirac. I fail to understand why.

After all these years Mittal has now shown an interest to do something in India. But that’s too little too late. Nothing’s happened yet. Why does our PM need to discuss something that is the personal financial interest of an NRI? Racism, one might say. One may say that what has happened to Mittal today might happen to other Indians tomorrow. Well, something even worse had ened some time back in France. Sikh children were banned from French schools as they were wearing patkas or turbans. The French had said many silly things. Don’t show your religion. It would damage the French. They might be terrorists. Cut your hair. Those people are still oppressed, because of racist and religious reasons. Our media is mum about a greater number of people. Our Sikh PM didn’t find this a moving enough thing to tell his French counterpart.

It is shameful. Probably Manmohan had his reasons. The Sikh in France don’t have Mittal’s money. Or probably Sonia Gandhi had asked him not to. Minority vote bank politics is ok in India, rather it is a must. When the reasons are right, we should shut up. LN Mittal is a very rich man. Let’s please him. Let’s pretend to appease Muslims. Sikhs anyways are a smaller vote bank, unlike Muslims. Probably, these were Congress’ thoughts.

And shame on our free press. Really, Mittal winning or losing another bid is not going to affect Indians in India in any way.

On Cricket Pundits!

I sit on my bean bag in front of the idiot box and look at “experts” analyse cricket. I listen to the drivel dished out by the ex-cricketers and say, “blessed be thy soul of the wise man who gave J L Baird’s invention the name - idiot box.” I happened to read Mr. Rajdeep Sardesai’s blog on his very interactive website and a few lines stuck out like a sore thumb. He said “At one level, the cricket punditry is valuable. Would you rather listen to someone whose played 50 tests or someone who has never scored a run or taken a wicket in his life?” and I could not help but feel let down that a comment like that should come from one of my favourite journalists. Please let explain to you why did it hurt so bad.

I, the average cricket follower, do need expert opinion on cricket matches and cricket, in general. But anybody who has played 50 international matches does not qualify as an expert on the sport. I would listen to someone who has not played a single match, if s/he speaks sense. I cannot get myself to believe that journalists like Sonali Chander and Rajdeep Sardesai aren’t experts but people like Aaqib Javed and Madan Lal are. That Salman Butt is pushing at deliveries outside the off stump and that Sehwag lacks footwork isn’t something an expert needs to tell me. Anybody who’s watched this beautiful game would know. And what is nowadays is passed off as analysis needs to be re-looked at. Painting a Shahenshah, analysing post match conferences or what a coach said, sic ad nauseum, is not what one calls analysis. And all that load of rubbish is dished out by ex-cricketers. To top it all there’s a world cup winning hero, who aspired to be the Indian coach, who starts singing the moment he is on TV. For heavens’ sake, please get them off the tube. Its no better in print. Moin Khan got a slap on his face when he wrote so insightfully about Sachin being a spent force, and was proven wrong. That shows how well our experts can analyse. And believe me, all hell breaks loose when somebody pits two ex-cricketers against each other for analysing a game. It seems less like analysis and more like a confederation of warring tribes.

I would, and I am sure that the majority of cricket lovers would, love to see people like Harsha Bhogle, Sharda Ugra, Ram Guha, Vijay Lokpally, R. Mohan, Sanjay Jha, Ayaz Memon etc. analyse for us. None of them have taken a wicket or scored an international run but they understand the sport better and analyse it wonderfully. If anybody were to ask - “how can they criticise Sachin for playing a bad shot? Has that person played a single international match?” – I believe that person should be asked to shut up. Going by that yardstick, if one happens to go to a restaurant and finds that the gravy tastes like grease and complains to the manager and if he or she were to be told “how many cook books have you written? Only a Tarla Dala or a Sanjeev Kapoor or a Jiggs Kalra have a right to criticise”. How would you feel? I don’t need to be a cook to give my views on food. Rajdeep Sardesai and Prannoy Roy have not been in any economic review committees but are they questioned when they analyse the budget? They haven’t stood for elections but does anybody question them when they give reasons as to why Nitish won and Lalu lost? The same should apply for cricket. I am not saying that all ex-cricketers are bad. Nobody can analyse the game as well as Richie Benaud, Sunil Gavaskar, Ravi Shastri or Geoff Boycott can. But to think that all ex-cricketers would be able to reach that level, is being foolish.

Nobody seems to have a problem with a bunch of buffoons selecting the cricket team as selectors. How many have played international cricket? This is just analysis that is happening on our TV sets, why can’t we have some real experts, who’ve dedicated their lives bringing cricket to us – thru their pen or thru the camera? That is why I feel let down when I surf news channels and am forced to choose between the awful and the rubbish ad infinitum. People like Prannoy Roy, Rajdeep Sardesai, Karan thapar, Barkha Dutt etc have really raised the bar as far as reporting news and current affiars goes because they didn’t get into the trap of letting the so called “experts” analyse it. Please use the same yardsticks as far as this analysing this beautiful game goes. Please choose real experts and ex-cricketres extremely carefully. Or else the die is cast as far as cricket analysis goes. Alea jacta est!!!