Politics, Cricket and Cricket Politics

It has been a quiet month for Indian cricket and the public and media focus in India has shifted to another favourite pre-occupation of many Indians – politics. While it is probably true that politics no longer holds the same passionate appeal in the minds of the masses as it did in the days of the original Madam Gandhi, nothing non-cricketing rakes up a frenzy in Indian minds as much as a general election drama to decide the country’s leadership for the next five years. The media does its bit, the psephologists and astrologers play demi-Gods, celebrities jump onto whatever political bandwagon stops at their doorstep - and the cricket-starved public laps up this fare wholeheartedly with little else to compete for attention.

Mind you, I am not complaining about or belittling the process – India is the largest democracy in the world and, despite glitches in the election process, on balance the process works. It is no mean task to conduct elections in a country like India with its billion-plus population and tremendous geographic and socio-political complexity. Despite these practical difficulties, the process rolls on. Indians should be proud of the fact that their country allows them a mechanism to decide their fate for themselves – whether they choose to exercise this right or not. Many countries in the world do not have this option.

But what has all this got to do with cricket ? Quite frankly, nothing.I just could not resist a comment on the hottest topic in India at the moment – the elections. Having followed the political fortunes of many leaders and parties over the last thirty years (yes, from pre-Emergency days to the current day), it has always been fascinating for me to follow the evolution of the political process, more than just the results of elections – which in themselves have sometimes been quite remarkable. I have followed closely the forming of parties and alliances, the splitting of parties, the rise of “upstarts” and the making and breaking of issues on the political agenda of many a party. Politics may have gone high-tech over the last decade or so but the underlying Machiavellian methods to political survival remain as strong as ever.

Now, onto some cricketing matters. If I had to pick the two hottest subjects in the cricketing world at the moment, they would undoubtedly be the Murali chucking issue and the Zimbabwe drama. Since there is not much cricket going on, these two items occupy centrestage in virtually every cricketing discussion on at the moment.

I am not a cricket expert but as a follower, I will share with you my humble views on these.

First on Murali. His getting to the world record has obviously drawn increased attention to his bowling action but I wonder what the ICC has been doing all this while. Now it says he must stop with the doosra but why did it not come up with this statement when he started bowling it a while ago ? Heath Streak says that all Murali’s “doosra” wickets should be disallowed and while he may well be right, it is not a practical suggestion. What has happened, has happened and you cannot go back to changing the record books. Murali was cleared years ago on his bowling action by the ICC, he has taken tons of wickets thereafter, now his doosra has come up for review and has been disallowed. Fine, he stops bowling the doosra and gets on with the rest of his arsenal – unless the ICC finds anything else irregular in his bowling. In that case, it is upto the ICC to step in IMMEDIATELY and prevent further damage – to the game and to the individual. It is not my place to make a judgment call on the legitimacy of Murali’s action, it is that of the ICC to make this call. While it dilly-dallies, many notable current and former players, from Bishen Bedi to Dion Ebrahim, have freely lambasted him – with due respect to all of them, it is not their call either. In my opinion, the most sensible comment on this whole story has come from one of my favourite cricketers, Anil Kumble. He is quoted as having said "Whatever needed to be done should have been done much earlier. You can't keep pointing fingers at Murali every time he takes a wicket." I couldn’t agree more.

Now, onto Zimbabwe. The politics of the Mugabe government have been a matter of discussion for a few years already in many an international forum. It was inevitable that this would spill over to sport and to cricket in particular, where Zimbabwe has an international presence. Already the cricket world cup last year saw a lot of tension and some very unpleasant incidents, what with England refusing to play in Zimbabwe, Nasser Hussain baring his disgust (at the ECB) in public, Henry Olonga considering himself as a “marked” man after refusing to take the field. For what was an otherwise very well-organised World Cup, this was clearly something that should have been prevented in the first place from happening. We are now more than a year down the road, Zimbabwe continues to be an enigma and the ICC continues to twiddle its thumbs on the matter, claiming it to be an internal Zimbabwe problem. True, it began as a Zimbabwe problem but it has now become a cricketing problem in general, what with the game being reduced to farcical proportions with Australia being virtually “forced” to play a second-string Zimbabwe side due to ICC regulations. It is the ICC which sets the rules for international cricket and it is upto the ICC to review its rules and modify them, from time to time, in keeping with changed circumstances. They claim to be the caretakers of the game – if they indeed have this role, in my opinion, they are not doing a very good job of it. Unlike the Murali controversy, the Zimbabwe controversy could not probably have been prevented by the ICC entirely but the embarrassment and impact could have been drastically reduced if the ICC had taken some firm steps and decisions when the controversy started instead of letting it escalate.

That’s it for now. I would welcome any feedback to the views expressed in this article.

Thank You, Pakistan !

And to think it almost did not happen.

The security fears before the series had made this almost a non-starter. It took some initiative and courage – on both sides – to finally ensure this series happened – and how! Barring one incident involving an Indian journalist (for which immediate action was taken), the entire tour has only received positive comment from every player, official, journalist or even Indian visitor. The ground support (and I do not mean support from the players, although some may agree there too) from Pakistanis to Indians has been overwhelming.

Some die-hard critics (and there are still plenty on both sides) may say this is all “hogwash”. They will argue that the countries remain hostile to each other. They will argue that one cricket series, showcased for the international community and in election-year, as a “friendship series” does not mean a thing. The core issues remain conveniently un-addressed and this feel-good factor, so carefully nurtured by the incumbent Indian government as part of its “India shining” campaign, is going to evaporate as soon as the elections are over or with the first signs of internal pressure on Musharraf.

I can fully understand where they are coming from. Two months of bonhomie cannot undo fifty-five years of mistrust. It would be naïve to think so. Generations have grown up on a diet of suspicion and history books have only fomented this hatred.

But – call me a dreamer – I would like to take the small positives from the last two months and weave my own fabric of hope around this. Pakistanis and Indians sitting next to each other in Karachi, waving flags of both countries, without fear or concern for any backlash. Was this “stage-managed”?

Pakistanis falling all over Ganguly, Dravid and even Balaji. Was this “stage-managed”?

Just to see the Pakistani angle, I have been ardently following the Pakistani media over the last two months. I was most pleasantly surprised by the total lack of rancour about India. Was this “stage-managed”? (Critics will jump on this one, saying Musharraf controls the press. I will not comment on this).

This cricket site where Indians and Pakistanis have made friends over the last month – was this friendship “stage-managed”?

Sure, one swallow does not make a summer. But I can see a horde on the horizon – if only we, the people, allow this.

In a previous article, I had talked about cricket being in good hands – in the hands of the people. Now, with this series over, is a much, much more difficult task on hand for these very people. Building on this platform and working on this tenuous relationship.

Friends, let’s be clear: the future of this relationship lies in OUR hands, not in the hands of our governments.

To my Indian friends I would like to say: “Pakistan has been the perfect host. We need to reciprocate with full warmth and respect”.

To my Pakistani friends, I would like to say “ A BIG BIG THANK YOU! I cannot speak for other Indians, but you have definitely found a place in my heart!”

Rawalpindi - and all that's right with it

The critics will dismiss it as hype but to the millions of Indian and Pakistani fans who now inhabit virtually every part of the globe the build-up to this Rawalpindi Test has been a drama in itself. Everything that a drama seeks to play out is on display – there is suspense (not so much a whodunit as a who’s in it), there is emotion (tons of it – one would expect nothing less in an India-Pak outing), there is relief (for those who believe they were “done in” at Lahore and are glad to have different men-in-white this time) and above all – there is the sense of “sitting on the edge of your seats” – something that you only get when the result is potentially so close.

Move over Ashes, with all your history you cannot come close to the drama that India and Pakistan provide – time and again, match after match. Drama, at its purest, cannot be contrived – it is, simply, of the people, by the people, for the people. Every ball in an India-Pak game is accompanied by “oohs” and “aahs”, every shot by “ohhs” and “waahs” – it is as if each ball has a responsibility to create a story in itself. However much the world may like to deny it, in cricket today, India and Pakistan lead the pack in terms of characters, mass following and, most importantly, intensity. The Ashes may have history but if I may be spared a term of today’s generation “India – Pakistan rock!”

Make no mistake – despite talk of matches being “fixed” and this being a “goodwill” series, there is still everything to play for. As Indian captain Ganguly made very clear before the first day of the series, he is not here for politics but for cricket. In short, he is here to win. The “goodwill” aspect will and, I daresay, has taken care of itself. Friends have been made – hopefully for a lifetime – but the simple mission that Ganguly and co. had set out for themselves almost exactly a month ago is now reaching its finale at Rawalpindi.

The growing popularity of one-dayers notwithstanding, many still believe that Test Matches are the true determinants of superiority of a team. They test a team over two innings and potentially five days and tend to cancel out any imbalance from a flash-in-the pan performance, so likely to cause a one-day upset. I for one, believe both variants of the game have their place – and while spectator value is probably higher in the one-dayers the very thought of the twists that a Test can potentially deliver is a lip-smacking one.

There is less than a day to go now for this last Test. Speculation will continue till the very last moment. Selections on both sides will be analysed and criticized (some may be applauded but I fear this will be drowned in the wave of criticism – decades of selector suspicion have honed the critical skills of us Asians and we have no qualms about being very vocal about them either). The pitch will be discussed to death. The “match fixing” subject (something that I suppose we will have to live with) will rear its head from time to time.

But one thing is for sure – the future of cricket is safe and in good hands. The hands of the people.