God Speed

Staying with cricket, there is a bit of a storm brewing about Shoaib Malik’s comments at the post match award ceremony after “The Match’. He said something to the effect that he and his team are sorry and extend apologies to Muslims all over the world for losing the match! Even giving him the benefit of doubt (the language he was speaking in not being his own and therefore there being a gap between intent and expression), there still seemed to be something mildly incongruous about the statement. I am not a chest-thumping secularist (in fact am not a chest-thumping anything), but it just seemed to me that there is no room for such public exhibitions of xenophobic jingoism in the pluralistic world of today. Private ideologies are one thing, but a public space, especially one which is concerned with a world far removed from religion, should not be the stage to articulate such constricted thoughts.

I think my friend Nikhil Mehra best summed it all in an e mail of his. Am reproducing the same below without his permission, but hey…its Mehra…the Understanding and Forgiving Soul!

"Did anyone else feel that Shoaib Malik's apology to the entire Muslim world was utterly and defenselessly preposterous?? This isn't like some chapter of the South-Asian crusades where the Hindu kafir defeated the righteous Muslims. Plus I dont think Indian muslims need an apology from him. Man, I thought this was behind us now that Inzi - the man who reads half the Quran before he answers a sentence - has been ousted. I thought the whole point behind Malik's appointment was to strip the Pak squad of this God Squad image.

He was naive. I dont think he's a fanatic but its reflective of the culture of the team where such a statement would be seen as normal. The blame for this pathetic Us against Them mentality that Shoaib has based on mere religion may also be rightly placed at the feet of the chimp that currently occupies the White House. He will never know the effect he has had.”

Need I say more. Me thinks not!

Of Cups and Towns

The other big event these past few days was the victory of the men in blue over Pakistan in the finals of the 20:20 cup. A very real feeling had been brewing for some time, that the color blue had actually turned a slight faded shade in recent times. The sight of portly men, hopelessly chasing cricket balls over the fields of England, just served to strengthen that suspicion. The team was beginning to seem like the Jewels of the Nizam...resplendent in their individual values, but fit only for a museum!

Fresh air was needed and what we got was a gale! A beautiful storm, full and confident, pulsating with the vibrancy of youth, running for large parts only on the impatience of a generation that has had nothing to call its own. Realms have already been written, and more will be, on how it was done, what it felt like and what this holds for the future. But leaving all this aside, I would like to talk about towns.

The small towns of this country is where the future of the country lies. And this is not restricted to cricket alone. Maybe this is nowhere better reflected, nowhere better articulated, than in the persona of Dhoni. More than Dhoni the cricketer, perhaps it lies with Dhoni the ‘Idea’. The idea of a boy from the back of beyond, leading the country, head priest at the altar of its one true religion. The great masses love Dhoni for his cricket; that is a given. But more than that, I think they love what he represents. Nasser Hussain summed it beautifully a few months back- “they love him because they see a bit of themselves in him”. The desire to be relevant is conceivably one of the most primal desires in man and the person-from-nowhere would love nothing better than to be considered so, on a stage greater than what his circumstances may offer. The fact that Dhoni has achieved it is a cause for celebration for them, a beacon of fearless hope if you like.

Mukul Kesavan calls this breed the ‘Mofussil Man’, one who is hungry and eager to be part of the tectonic changes which he perceives yet seldom understands. The great attraction of ‘Bunty aur Babli’ was again in the promise it held for the Mofussil Man, much as the great attraction of cricket lies in the hope of upward mobility and acknowledged significance it offers him.

There is of course a risk in overanalyzing too much. So therefore, maybe I should simply relax, enjoy the ride and get the mofussil theories stored in the bag. Bring on the Aussies…the boys are hungry!!

First Posts and Last Songs

I thought that a good way to start this blog would be put in my two pence worth on something that has achieved almost mythical proportions in the hearts of the people of my home town Shillong. To call this an 'event' would be to trivialize it, but to call it a sort of 'social churning' (as some have suggested) would be attributing too much importance to what is or was merely an articulation of relevance by the people of Shillong.

What is being referred to is of course Indian Idol 3 and the boy who almost won it- Amit Paul. To try and document the kind of support he enjoyed in Shillong, swinging from adulation to worship and bordering on hysteria, would be a redundant exercise on my part. The stories are too many and the space here is too small. Then to try and comprehend the sense of grief at his loss would again be impossible. How does one begin to understand why so many cried that night or how does one even begin to explain how grown adults of reason and logic felt a lump in their throats and a heaviness in their hearts? I will attempt none of this. My point is a little more obtuse.

The reason I think that Amit deserved the adulation he received was not just because he was a good singer. There have and will be better ones. It is simply because he made Shillong smile for a while. He made a small town feel happy, the sort of happiness that comes from sharing a common bond, a common thread.

There could be other familiar points of interface for this town, like cricket to name the most obvious example, but none which is so immediate or none which is so close to home. It was almost like the success of Amit had the opportunity of being a physical presence in the lives of people, something that could be grasped, touched, stroked, tasted and smelt. When a drama is enacted, the proximity of the actors to the audience often determines the connection that is set up between the two. In this case, as often happens in small towns, everyone seemed to ‘know’ Amit and therefore everyone rejoiced when he succeeded.

His success lies not in reaching the last stage of the contest. His true success lies in making people forget the constants that define their largely uneventful lives and offering them a chance to feel part of something bigger, something happier. No one knows what is to become of him in the future. What we do know is what he did to our present for a while. For that, Thank You Amit!!