DIVERSITY OF INDIA AND CURIOUS CASE OF “STUPID” RISHABH

 

Hindustan/ India/ Bharat has been a land of Hindus for time immemorial.  Without going too deep, it can be said that it is well accepted that  to call “Hinduism” a “Religion” is also a stretch of imagination. This is because unlike the monotheistic religions where there is acceptance of only one God (mark that G is capital), Hindus never have had one God. In Monotheistic  religions you have only one God, there are these set of rules (commandments if wish to refer to them as) and then there one life. You live life as much as possible following these rules and then there will be a judgement day.  It is therefore an endeavor to live the most “correct” life  as possible as per the set of rules laid down. Conformity to the rules and following one God is hallmark of such religions. Christianity, Islam and Judaism emerge from this school of thought. Now compare that to Hinduism where core to the belief is the idea of “rebirth” (which is a metaphor for cyclic nature).  In Hinduism one believes in nature everything is there for a reason. There is no judgement. Hunger is the primary driver of our actions. If the tiger is hungry, it will eat sheep. If as a human we prevent Tiger from eating the sheep, we are in turn killing the tiger who will die of starvation. Hence there is no judgement as well here. Hunger demands food and actions for the same cannot be judged. “Imagination” differentiates us from animals. However Hindus firmly believe in Karma. All actions will have a consequence. Hindus have lived their lives across the country believing in their own “gods” which could be a tree, an animal, a mountain, a statue. Since there is no beginning or an end and no judgement, Hindus have been diverse. Hindus have also followed their own different ways of life for example a dalit from Kashmir has nothing in common with dalit of Tamil Nadu.

 

India has been barraged with a lot of influences from people from the monotheistic religions and have unsuccessfully tried to convert Hindus/ India to a uniform block. It is for all practical purpose, it is easy to govern a uniform society rather than a diverse one. It can be argued it will be more efficient way of governing. Businesses also like uniformity. Let us take an example here. If you were to market a detergent in India, wont a businessman ideally like one language of communication and one sensibility. Makes for an easier way of doing business.

 

Same is the case for politicians. Present dispensation who has been funded by the “Hindu Vegetarian Merchant class” has also strived for the homogeneity. So be it one Nation- One national language, one education curriculum. In fact if the present dispensation would have its way we would have to declare India a vegetarian country by now. They have already declared some parts of India, alcohol free (as if in Hinduism alcohol is prohibited). BJP under Modi has even tried to reduce Hinduism to one avatar of Vishnu, RAM. Mind you no Sita, Laxman or Hanuman  with Ram in the Ram temple. Or lets say since it’s a Ram Lalla temple then no mother of Ram? They would like to talk about Krishna but not Radha. Radha is a difficult relation to explain through their world view. So you shall find absence of Radha from BJP under Modi. The present dispensation obviously would like to claim  the politics of BR Ambedkar but would never address the core issue BR Ambedkar had with his understanding of Hinduism. BJP under Modi would like sameness as diversity is too complex for them to handle.

With the tone of the passage so far it would be clear, I am fan of  diversity. I grew up in Nashik where near by we have Shree Saptashrungi Shaktipeeth. It is common practice there to offer goat as sacrifice. She is reverent to me. I also happen to be son of north Indian Parents who revere Vishnav Devi of Katra. Non Vegiterian food is strictly prohibited at her place. I have lived in peace with both the ideas. No judgement. No one was correct and no one was  incorrect. In India, in Hinduism there is not correct or wrong way of living life. In fact there are no judgements. Nature does not operate that ways.

Yet in other walks of lives, Indian Hindus or Indians in general have become monotheistic. Cricket (Test Cricket)  is a way of life. The way you play cricket tells a lot about you. In cricket there is a coaching book issued by MCC. MCC is the club who are self appointed custodians of Cricket and own the famous Cricket ground Lords. It tells you have to hold a bat, how much to open up legs. Which shot to play and when. It tells you the run up you need to have as a fast bowler, the jump, the rotation of the arms everything. MCC in England obviously are inspired by their monotheistic way have prescribed the way game is to be played. I must confess I haven’t read the book 1^st hand but over the years listening to experts have figured out that a number 9 is expected to be formed in your stance while playing a cover drive. I know by hearing what a smooth fast baling action looks like.

 

The problem arises when there is someone who does not follow these rules. Shewag is the name that comes to the mind when we talk about someone who did not follow the rules. His feet hardly moved but he made that up with excellent hand eye co ordination. Moreover his obsession to get to milestones with 6s made him a outlier. The coaching books was thrown out of window more often than not. He scored  some of India’s biggest scores in Test cricket. However he disrupted the way the test cricket was played at the top. People “judged” him against the coaching manual and he was found guilty of not following the same. The man who played more than 100 tests for India with an average of 49+ did not get a proper send off. In 122 tests Virat Kohli has an average of 47.2. Despite that it is safe to say that Shewag never enjoyed the popularity that was bestowed on Virat. While we like to pride our self as a diverse society, we have turned monotheistic due to our education.  

 

Another outlier that comes to mind in who paid the price of who he was the cricket he played was Kevin Pietersen. The man made “Switch hits” popular. However he questioned the way cricket was being played by England at the time. He paid the price and was not allowed to play at least 3-4 years of cricket.

 

People from India who are supposed to embrace diversity suddenly turn to monotheism when it comes to cricket. This is a good place to talk about Rishabh Pant. Rishabh, we all know, is a free spirit who likes to take the match to the opposition. He works hard on his unconventional technique. It is a testimony of his dedication that he is playing at pinnacle of the cricket after the life threatening accident. He is a fighter. He backs himself and his technique to counter punch  any bowler and any situation. In the last tour of India to Australia in 2022, he won game for India from place where no one saw it coming. Players like Pant who are exceptionally talented and work hard on their skill are no doubt different from the ones you get out of coaching manual. They are who they are because of the way they think and the way they execute their skills. In the 1^st innings of the MCG test when he got out playing a falling flick, he was called “Stupid, Stupid, Stupid” by none other than Sunil Gavaskar. It was understandable. Sunilji played his cricket exactly as was written in the “Commandments of cricket”. His criticism should be taken with a pinch of salt especially because he is also an very old man now. However I saw people who otherwise seem to be normal Indians, who cannot embrace the diversity of idea that Rishabh brings to table,  react rather violently to that shot. One of my close mates mocked the shot by showing us the demonstration. (the demonstration was not good as it takes skills to play the shot and fall the was pant does). These are people who are working at top 1% organisations of the world where they make a conscious effort to be diverse. They are Hindu Indians who are supposed to embrace the chaos that comes with diversity and yet when it comes to unconventional players, it is thrown out of window.

 

My problem with this criticism of Rishabh is as under

·         Just because the shot is not in your manual it cannot be termed wrong. We Indian wont follow the “commandments” of Cricket.

·         If a player has practiced a shot (like KP had done with switch hit) and plays it with good percentages, it is wrong to talk ill about it till the time Risk to reward ratio is skewed in wrong direction.

·         What you cannot understand cannot be wrong. It is lack of your imagination. To link the success of such shots to luck is undermining the hard work of the athlete who has developed innovative shot to get an advantage over his rival

·         I also hear that if Pant needs to play the game he does he needs to come down the order. He cannot play that game at 5. The simple counter is if no, 4 can get out 90%  times playing a 5% shot Pant can play his game at 5 without any issue. His records shows he has been successful doing so.

 

Over this series Virat got out 9 out of 10 times playing cover drive. Every time cheaply. There is absolutely no percentage in that shot for him and yet he was not called stupid. The same friend failed to demonstrate the “Cover drive” of Virat.  Why ?  May be because a cover drive is in  the book and no matter how many times you fail playing it, you cannot be “Stupid” playing it. Why ? Why is Virat not called Stupid playing the cover drive when he doesn’t know how to play it.

 

Manjrekar rightly said, one cannot judge Pant by the way he get out. Currency of Cricket is Runs and Wickets. If you have to criticize Pant do it when he isn’t scoring enough runs.

 

Diversity is supposed to corner stone of Indian ethos. The Hindu ethos is respecting and acknowledging what you do not know. India has failed Rishabh Pant by reacting the way they did. Gautam Gambhir, the coach, would be an idiot if expects a horse to walk like a donkey or vice versa.  As a coach he needs to use the different styles each player brings and divert it for the well being of the team. There is no one way to live life. There is no one way to play test cricket! Embrace diversity is my message to all who have read this so far.

My 2 cents of advice to Rishabh Pant : STAY  STUPID  ….. STAY HUNGRY !!!!

The fall of My hero

 

When I was studying for Engineering, I distinctly remember my brown folder in which I would keep papers for submissions. At its cover - on the top I had neatly stuck a half A4 size close pic of Mohammad Azharuddin with his Reebok bat. The picture was cut with great care as and I took time and pain to cut the part where Azhar’s body and bat was extracted. Those were also the days when I had 3 Sportstar posters of Azhar in my room.

In the 90s, Sachin had truly arrived. It was natural that Sachin was the declared love of most who followed cricket. However most of these romantics of the game had another “forbidden love”. Mohammed Azharuddin. For me he was my first love. In fact people of a certain vintage will hate to confess their love for Mohammed Azharuddin in cricket and Sonali Bendre in films.

My first memories of cricket are from 1986 World cup and there abouts. I remember a small booklet of Indian players representing India in the world cup in the Hindi “Cricket Samrat”. It was mentioned on Azhar’s page that during that time he was the only cricketer in the world to have scored 3 hundreds in his first 3 tests. As a matter of fact that record still holds till such date.

We can talk about his statistics and records. There is a bit of tragedy in there. He played 99 tests for India. Not 100.  But 99!!!! When he had to be done with his career, he had played more ODIs than anyone else in the history of cricket at that time. For a while he had been the most loved cricketer in the country. There was an innocence about him, a shyness that was startling, even irritating in an international superstar. He burst into tears when sledged in Australia. He was God-fearing, polite, soft-spoken, modest - all the qualities Indian fans love in a player. And he used the cricket bat like a magic wand, seeming to merely wave it over the ball to send it to the boundary. There was a gentleness to it; even the fiercest drives never screamed or imitated tracer bullets. His wrists brought back memories of Gundappa Viswanath and even Ranjitsinhji, especially for those like me who hadn't seen these greats play. How could you not love him? And man did I love him!

One cannot talk about Azharuddin  and  now talk about “Wrists”  of M Azharuddin. The joint between the hand and the forearm – the wrist – gives humans a degree of dexterity and flexibility. When an artist leverages the benefits of the wrist and makes use of this “rare” art, magic is created. Take the wrist-play out of Mohammad Azharuddin and you would take away the soul from his batting. His batting was delectable to the eye when he was in full flow. The struggles made him look ordinary. But Azharuddin, throughout his career, was the harbinger of the hope that a miracle was around the corner. When on song, he would decimate the opposition, not with brute force, but with silken touch.

Similarly, one cannot talk about M Azharuddin and then not speak of his fielding. He can extraordinary in gully. His slip catching could only be matched by Mark Waugh till such day. The speed with which he would reach the ball, the release of the ball with wrists from back of the body …. Man there was a swagger even on the field. He definitely had a swagger with his walk, his collar half up. This was however not the Viv Richards kind of swagger. It was confident and yet not flamboyant. It was an Indian swag which was confident but respectful to others.

When it comes to his best innings people will point out the 1^st 3 hundreds in Calcutta, Chennai and Kanpur followed by 93 Not out on his ODI debut against Pakistan in Benson and Hedges world championship or or his Adelaide hundred in  92. What I remember is his defiant innings in 1996 in Eden Gardens when he hit Lance Klusener for 4 fours in an over. India lost that test and the series was on the line. Azhar scored a quick 163 in Kanpur to set up 2-1 series win. Immediately in a month India was playing tests in South Africa. In the 2^nd test at Cape Town, Azhar and Sachin’s partnership of 230 is the story for the ages. Azhar was at his aggressive best scoring a 110 ball 115. Yes it was a test match. Such stories were not new with Azhar’s batting. In 1988, Azhar smashed the then fastest ODI century bringing up his hundred off 62 balls against New Zealand. In 1996, he equalled Kapil Dev’s record for the fastest test 100 which he smashed in 74 balls! He also has scored 100 runs by himself in a session in 1990 against England in England.

So here was the rockstar of Indian cricket who captained for a long period of time and yet when he scored a test 100 in South Africa in his 99^th Test, the Match fixing scandal broke out. Not that this was totally unexpected. 81 All out chasing 120 at Bridgetown was a reminder. Many in Indian cricket knew, India was losing matches it should have one. The Hansie Cronje revelations and CBI report came with Tehalka revelations. BCCI banned Azhar from playing for life. While the life ban was lifted later but Azhar’s career came to an end diametrically opposite the way it started. The heart break for fans like me was enormous. I lost my cricketing innocence. I was disillusioned and didn’t watch the game for almost 6 months to a year. He did not betray the country but every fan of his.

To make it worse, he has never publicly acknowledged the mistake. On the contrary he remarked that he was being targeted as he was a minority. Truth cannot be far from this. Someone even like a Balasaheb Thackrey had called the former captain “An Ideal Muslim”.

Millions like me have had their hearts broken and unfortunately the closure never came. Azhar has never acknowledged the mistake. In fact a butchered and low grade movie makes the closure even more difficult. It was the 1^st hear break and one has still not be able to close it and move on. Even now like an old lover, when one quietly snoops at his batting videos, one cannot but forget the truth and immerse in his artistic batting. Like most love stories, this story ended with a tragedy and no closure.

My hero had fallen !  

UNBURDENING OF KOHLI : MASTERSTROKE

Act 1 : Melbourne Cricket ground is filled with 90,000 spectators for 1^st T20 World Cup encounter between arch rivals India and Pakistan. Pakistan had scored 160 in 1^st innings on a swinging day. India were 45/4 at the end of 10 overs. They needed another 116 runs in 10 overs. Kohli was at 12 off 22 balls.

 

What followed was, in words of Kohli, “his best T20 innings” where the world stood and acknowledged the greatness of the KING. Clearly to many, the potential was realized. The promise was kept!

 

The question to be asked is therefore, what led to this surreal performance. Virat Kohli had made his debut way back in 2010 in Zimbabwe. He was Captain of RCB in IPL from  2011 un till 2021. He labored as a captain of Indian International team from 2017 to 2021. Kohli has played 110 International matches at an impressive Average of 51.97 at a SR of 138. Also in the IPL he has played 223 matches at average of 36 and a SR of 129. Important point is that he hasn’t been able to win a single International or IPL title.

 

Similarly, while Kohli has been a team member of the World cup winning 2011 squad, he hasn’t been able to convert his ability to Championships for India in 50 over format. India lost for the 1^st time in an ICC tournament to Pakistan  in 2017 finals of ICC Champions Trophy. Similarly, as his last assignment as captain in T20 cricket, India lost to Pakistan in World Cup. Kohli has the dubious distinction to be the only Indian Captain to lose to Pakistan in a World Cup in any format. He in fact as a  captain he has lost twice to Pakistan in ICC Tournaments. That is not welcome in Indian Cricket.

 

His personal success against the backdrop of failure of his team is not something new for Indian Cricket . Sachin Tendulkar will recount his  tenure as a captain. However, what needs to be understood is that the team that played with Sachin was different from the team that played with Virat. India under Virat had arguably the best resources in World Cricket at that moment in any format of the game. The battery of fast bowlers, the skill and diversity of its all rounders, the class and aggressive nature of its batting lineup. Add to it the fact that the unit was  the best fielding unit of the world. Kohli indeed should be credited for lifting the fitness standards of the team.

 

Clearly the only reason for Indian team to be not winning has to do with Coach Ravi Shastri and Captain Virat Kohli. The team capitulated at every knockout moment in an ICC tournament. That they could not deliver an ICC championship with all the resources of the world. Here Indian cricket asked itself a question: what is more important: pleasing ego of a “Star” or to try and win the most coveted Championship the sport has to offer. BCCI selection committee chose to replace Virat with the most decorated T20 Captain available i.e. with Rohit Sharma. It is well known that Rohit’s approach to the game allows teams to focus in pressure. Also what it has done is that it has freed Virat to focus his efforts on what he does best - batting. While his ego and that of his followers will not allow them to see this fact but the unburdening of failed Captain was apt both for Virat and Team India. Also the fact that Virat’s attitude is what it is, he will try and prove people wrong. That attitude is now being channelized positively for the championship we so cherish. One does not care what he thinks of people who removed him from his captaincy as long as that is contributing positively to the interest of Indian Cricket team.

 

This team and please mark my words….. has what it takes to win this and many more forthcoming championships. To me, with the resources we have, if we do not win every 2^nd ICC championship, we are not doing justice to our talent and resources. I am of the firm opinion that in Melbourne on 13^th Nov 2022 India will bring home World Cup after 15 years. That shall be the final act of the script written by Dada. Act 1 is done. Final act shall be on 13^th Nov 2022.

It has been a bit too long that we had to wait.  THE WAIT IS OVER !!!!!

 

SECULARISM AT 46 …….. INDIA AT 75

 

Secularism at 46

It is a known fact since the Modi Government displayed the original Preamble in 2015 and not the altered one that contains the word SECULAR, that the word was introduced in 1976 by Indira Gandhi through 42^nd constitutional Amendment.

 

Secularism is a much more complex subject actually than what people think it is. Some people can think it is negation of all religion, while to others it can mean an absolute separation of religion and state. Still others might feel that the Constitution should advocate articles that govern aspects of a religion; a few might even say the state should not involve itself in matters of religious education; many might even feel that a truly secular Constitution should demand a uniform civil code. I shall not attempt to interpret it.

 

It is again a very well known fact that Dr. BR Ambedkar was against the word “secular” and also “Socialist” being used in the preamble or in the constitution itself.  He said in Constituent assembly in 1948

 

“Sir, I regret that I cannot accept the amendment of Prof KT Shah. The Constitution is merely a mechanism for the purpose of regulating the work of the various organs of the State. It is not a mechanism whereby particular members or particular parties are installed in office. What should be the policy of the State, how the Society should be organised in its social and economic side are matters which must be decided by the people themselves according to time and circumstances. It cannot be laid down in the Constitution itself, because that is destroying democracy altogether”

 

Our Constitution has laid down rules as to how certain practices within religions are unconstitutional, even criminal, while other practices that hurt a particular religious sentiment but are practiced by other religious groups – like cow slaughter – were banned. Additionally, the question of religious education – grants provided by governments actually do not allow us to be really secular by any stretch of imagination. So Indian secularism was conceptually very hollow by design.

 

Hence it is not my endeavor to raise calls for “Saving Secularism”. In the name of “Saving Secularism”, one cannot be blaming or mocking the Hindus or ‘normalising’ Aurangzeb or Ghazni. However I would like to raise a more pragmatic question. Do we want one in seven Indians alienated because of their faith? At the very least, this would make for a very imperfect Indian democracy.

 

With the end of Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, M.J. Akbar and Syed Zafar Islam’s Rajya Sabha tenures, Narendra Modi’s BJP will be left with no Muslim in either House. Read this with the following:

 

•In both the 2014 and 2019 elections, the Modi-Shah BJP won full Lok Sabha majorities without any of their seven and six candidates, respectively, winning. This, while 20 crore Muslims live in India. Or one in seven.

•In Uttar Pradesh, in 2017 and 2022, the Modi-Shah-Yogi BJP won humongous majorities without fielding any Muslim candidate. Muslims are about 20 per cent of the state’s population. Or one in five.

•In Assam, the Modi-Shah-Himanta BJP won two majorities in 2016 and 2021. It fielded 17 Muslims in the two elections combined, but only one won, in 2016. One in three of Assam’s people is Muslim.

•It is that rare juncture in our history when a Muslim sits on no constitutional chair in New Delhi (there’s one governor, Arif Mohammad Khan, Kerala), nor holds a position in the 76-member council of ministers, isn’t a chief minister anywhere. Of the 87 secretaries in the central government, two are Muslim.

 

Contradict all of the above with the fact that Muslims alone were once solely responsible for Mr. Vajpayee to lose the trust vote by 1 vote in 1999. The Word secularism was used like untouchability against the BJP then. One BJP leader has said “The Muslims have a veto on who rules India.”

 

However can any Indian say that in the “Golden Era” of “Secularism”, the state of affairs for the muslims in India improved their condition.  Truth be told, most Muslims continue to remain one of the most economically and in terms of education, the most backward class of people. The only promise muslims were served was a sense of security against the BJP at that time. Now the hell has broken on them ! So you see the choice they had…. Choice between very bad and ver very very bad !

 

The question I am asking is what has “Secularism” delivered in last 46  years since the same was introduced in our constitution in 1976. If anything, I think, the muslims of India have been more “Othered” than ever! The forefathers of the constitution, rightly so, did not keep it. The word has only polorised our country than bought it together. BJP has been the ultimate winner. They must thank Indira Gandhi to have served it to them on a platter.

 

 

India at 75

Now coming to our review of India at 75. I will start with two question. Which is the best Engineering / Management / medical institutes in India? Answers will definitely be the IITs, the IIMS, the AIIMS etc. The common thread between them is that they are all Government institutions. Sympathizers of Congress might just remind us that all started by J Nehru. The next question might bring them to place. How many of those reading this piece send their children to Government schools? I will be surprised even if one individual wants to send their wards to a Government School. This example itself is enough for me to conclude that our country is a land of missed opportunities and misplaced priorities.

 

In the year of “Azadi ka Amrit Mahotsav”, Indian Government approved “Revival package” for BSNL amount to Rs 1.64 Lakh Crores! What has the government to do in running of a telecom company in India in today’s day and age is best left for the reader to analyse. If one doesn’t want to criticize the present dispensation, then we can say that the government of the day, like their predecessors, have misplaced sense of priority.

 

Right from Nehru to Modi, Indian governing class has made blunders after blunders. The insurance sector of India has LIC as the biggest player, SBI is India’s biggest bank by some distance, the DESCOMs in every state of the country run into huge losses…… and yet we run the country with exactly the same mindset as was done in the 1950s. Even today, Indian government tells us what we can export and what we cannot. Farmers today, thanks to their senseless opposition to farm laws gave that power on the platter to the government who anyways wants to control what we see, what we eat, what we export and so on.

 

Look at the discourse of the politics today. The entitled ruling party MP announced in parliament in the monsoon session, “Humne Freefund ka khana khilaya 80 Crore garibo ko COVID mein”. The gentleman does not realise of his statement. No. 1 the statement comes from the place of entitlement. We are the kings and we feed people. No. 2 the gentleman is not ashamed that 80 Crore people are so poor that they needed the “Freefund ka Khana”. No. 3, he forgets that it is not Modi- Shah’s money that is spent on this scheme. It is yours and mine that we pay in form of taxes. So in these 75 years we have this as a ruling class.

 

At this point in time I must also speak about the Yuvraj of India. What can be said more about the shallowness of Indian democracy that a 5^th Generation dynast (dynasty started in 19^th Century end) is your chief opposition leader in 21^st century. We celebrate the fact that we are the “biggest democracy”. Question we must ask as a nation to ourselves is. Seriously are we?

 

One must also confess that it is not the government alone the part of the problem. I work in Electrical Engineering field in UAE. Here we deal with vendors from across the globe. As an Indian, it is my natural instinct to try and get more “Made In India” products to this market. However in my limited experience I find even the private sector happy with status quo. They do not wish to address issues related to quality of product, services etc. Excuses range from “Humare yahan to aaise hi hota hai (in our country we do it this ways)” to innumerable public holidays to anything and everything. The Indian private sector is not ready to take on the world! It is no surprise to me that we levy heavy duties on even import of consumer electronics and now even gold! We as a country do not have an attitude towards competing with the world. We enjoy the “my baap Licence raj” where the government decides what business we can do, how much we can do  and hence also protects Indian manufacturing from external competition.

 

What has changed with India in the last decade of these 75 years is the way votes are garnered. From the 1980s until 2010, votes of Muslims + any numerically dominant caste would win an election for you. The politics of parties like the SP (Yadav+ Muslim), BSP (Dalits+ OBC+ Muslims), RJD (Yadav+ Muslim) was run with this thread. It was Mandal- Kamandal Politics. Muslims were the common denominator in this politics.

 

Today, Modi – Shah combine have changed the equation from Caste based to religion based. So the Muslim vote of 14% is irrelevant. Their audacity stems from the fact that till the time even if 50% Hindus vote for them, they shall win hands down. The politics does not recoginse that the “Othering” of 1 in 7 Indian is a dangerous volcano. We have seen glimpses of that strangled anger during the CAA NRC row.

 

India at 75 is what could have been rather than what we are. Most of the Whatsapp university lessons shall be of glorious times of medieval age. Not what is the state of the country today.

 

To me India at 75 is a story of missed opportunities and misplaced priorities!

 

Jai Hind !!!

 

(PS: I will not change my DP to Tricolor)

 

 

Time to Rebuild!

Greatest Indian Test captain resigned as he conceded that Indian batting is a problem. Why and how did it reach here?

That’s the thing about good times. While they last, they make you ignore the warning signs and delay the necessary course-correcting actions — ‘if it’s not broken, why try to fix it?’ In the last five years, Indian men’s Test cricket team has seen a lot of success and a few failures. They won every Test series at home. Away, they won in Australia (twice), Sri Lanka, England (leading the unfinished series 2-1) and West Indies.

However something was rotting in the system and the team management headed by Mr. Ravi Shastri simply ignored it. That was the batting.

“In God I believe, for everything else bring Data”.  So let us look at the data. We shall look at the data from roughly 25 years. That was the last time India had gone through a big churn. 

 The data below shows India’s batting and bowling averages over different time spans. It is not rocket science to realise that more the difference between the batting and bowling averages, the better the Win/ loss ratio gets.

Clearly the golden period of Indian cricket was from 2016 to 2019 where Indian batsmen were scoring 16 runs per wicket more than what Indian bowlers were taking wickets. No wonder the Win to loss ratio for the period was 3.75. Highest it ever has been. In fact most of us will be surprised by the fact as that was the era where Indian team was doing better than the legendary West Indies of 1975-1985 and Australian team of 1996-2004. Here are their Stats of their high  period 

 

However the period under contention for India is from 1^st Jan 2020 till date. Here, there is a dramatic drop in the batting average. The bowling average is almost the same. What has happened as a result is for us to see. The Win to loss ratio has come down to 1.13 which is even worse than  the decade of 2006-2015.

So, the obvious question is how did the batting average of the Indian team fell to such astonishing lows. The answer lies in the middle order. The number 3, 4 and 5 of the Indian team have to be singled out for the same. Let me try and illustrate the same

To give some perspective below are the averages of the greatest batting line up of all times in India i.e. the era from 1996 to 2005

Now let us face some facts.

• Over all test batting average of Virat is 50.39, Pujara is 43 and Rahane stands at 38.42.
• Clearly Rahane and Pujara  would have found it difficult to be even in the team with those overall career numbers. Ask VVS Laxman and S Ganguly who always came under the scrutiny and were rarely assured place in the team. 
• Virat would have drowned under the weight of R Dravid, S Tendulkar and V Shewag. He wouldn’t be called as great as he is considered today. Frankly speaking, the numbers say he is not. It is just that his peers make him look good.

For the last 2 years Virat, Pujara and Rahane have average of 28 ,26 and 24 respectively. India’s overall batting average is 25.4. Technically speaking they are scoring on an average equal to a number 10 and 11. These are numbers not of a series but for last 2 years! Ideally they should not be picked even in a Zimbabwe side leave aside top Test playing nation.  

Hence during these two years we saw : 

• India team has defeated Australia  2-1. Heavy lifting in that series was done by R Pant who scored 274 runs at an average of 68. V Kohli averaged 14, C Pujara 33 and A Rahane 38. Incidentally S Gill scored 259 runs at a whopping average of 51
• India is leading unfinished Pataudi Trophy 2-1. Here R Sharma has 368 runs with avg of 52. KL is 315 at 42, Pujara 227 at 32 and Kohli as 218 and 31.
• India has two scores of below 100. Batting collapses are a common sight in Indian cricket for last 2 years 
• India lost WTC Finals and now the South African Series 2-1 

However, it is interesting to understand what R Shastri, the former coach was doing. Didn’t he see it coming. It is well known that R Shastri was not selected by expert panel which comprised of VVS, S Tendulkar and S Ganguly. He was hand picked by  V Kohli. The then court appointed administrators did not show any spine. They gave in to whims and fancies of the star, V Kohli.  A dog cannot bite the master that feeds him. Can it? R Shastri saw that the last coach was removed by the captain. How could he stand upto the star! He had no incentives to take on the captain, if the captain is wrong. How could one expect Ravi Shastri give a feedback to V Kohli. Result was that R Shastri was no more than a cheerleader without a skirt in the period. 

During this period as far as V Kohli goes, he had no choice but to defend C Pujara and A Rahane. When all the 3 were performing at the same pathetic levels, how could he drop the other two and continue. By keeping them in the team he looks better than them and people dont question his place in the team. That is precisely what happened in the last 2 years. 

Now, V Kohli’s captaincy was untenable. To his credit, he did not let the slump of his bad form affect the chances of the team. However, his numbers are now adversely affecting the team. With R Shastri gone, it is clear  R Dravid would not allow this to continue any further. He had no choice but to give up his captaincy. His poor form for 2 years costed him his captaincy! 

V Kohli will now be expected to concentrate on his batting and give us those crucial 40-50 more runs per match that he is capable of giving. He was a world class act at one point in time. He has fitness that many can only be jealous off. He has already given up captaincy of IPL and Indian team. He has to become No. 1 Test batsman.   

Also now it is time that C Pujara and A Rahane be thanked for their services  and India moves on to the next generation. The likes of Vihari, S Iyer, S Gill, P Shaw, R Gaikwad are available. Indian Team management has to show faith in the young talent and move on. Yes an era has ended with resignation of V Kohli but that also serves as an opportunity.

For India, it is time to rebuild. It is plain good luck that such job always comes to the likes of Rahul Dravid and Saurav Ganguly. They again have to pick Indian cricket from its lows and take it to its rightful place which is at the top. 

It is time to rebuild! 

Jai Hind! 

WHY IS HISTORY OF PRECOLONIAL INDIA IMPORTANT

 Whenever questions are asked about what we can learn from history, it invariably leads to philosopher George Santayana’s oft-quoted aphorism: “Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it”. Studying history enables us to develop better understanding of the world in which we live. Building knowledge and understanding of historical events and trends, especially over the past century, enables us to develop a much greater appreciation for current events today. And if we heed Santayana’s warning, then remembering history – and learning important lessons from it – should help us to avoid previous mistakes and prevent previous misdeeds from happening again.’

 

 

The liberals in India are moaning the rise of Modi-Shah- Yogi in India. However as some of the modern historians have started to study and write on the phenomena of rise of Modi, one does realize that Modi was not made in a day. It took more than a century of ideological battle that Sangh parivar fought to reach there. One of the most important reason for the rise of Hindutva regime is the way India wrote its history since the advent of Congress- especially its precolonial history.  

 

The Anti Colonial nationalism pioneered by in opposition to the British had applied a romantic gloss on pre colonial India. It was an Eden vandalized by Satanic Europeans But had the British really ruptured Indian historic Continuity? Or was it India’s decline, precipitated by centuries of conquest, that enable Britain to so quickly to overpower the subcontinent?

 

The “Pre- Congress”  history taught in India goes something like this

• ·        India was a prosperous country before British Arrived to India.
• ·        Mughals were these great rulers who were “Secular” and they contributed to the great civilization that India was and it was “Melting Pot of Cultures”
• ·       Ganga-Jamni Tehzeeb prevailed in India where Hindus and Muslims of the country lived happily and harmoniously and it was only when the British who employed their wicked Divide and Rule theory and caused problems which ultimately led to the partition of India
• ·      A fully developed national consciousness existed in the subcontinent before the arrival of the British. They smashed it and divided the natives.

Singling the British out as uniquely disruptive villains proved a convenient way for republican India’s secular intellectuals to bypass awkward questions that ought, in the long term interest of the country, to have been confronted head on. The airbrushing of the pre-colonial past was intended to deny ammunition to all those who cited the creation of Pakistan or a “Hindu Rashtra”. Historiographers tasked by the secular Congress establishment to clarify India’s past, motivated by their desire to do good, caused immeasurable harm by blurring it. The nation that emerged out of it is now without a rudimental apprehension of their difficult past. Medieval India, despite all the evidence of its methodical disfigurement was depicted in Schoolbooks as idyll where Hindus and Muslims coexisted in harmony and forged an inclusive idea of India which the British came and shattered. This fable has been so deeply internalized that in 1998, India’s then President KR Narayanan was able to tell an audience in Turkey that before the intrusion of the evil Europeans the interaction between the old civilization of India – the Hindu Civilization and the Islamic civilization was a Friendly experience.

 

Unfortunately for them and the national project – grand mosques of Northern India are still decorated with stone tablets in which you can still see traces of the preexisting liturgical monuments that were razed to furnish the building material for them. The chronicles of the subcontinent’s medieval rulers are full of pornographic descriptions of the horror with which the place was teemed.

 

All imperialism is vicious, but that is not the standard adopted by India’s secular historians. They tell us, Portuguese “were intolerant of the existing religions in India and did not hesitate to force people to become Christians”. Indeed they did all they could to make more converts. However on the other hand Islamic invaders “did not produce any fundamental change in the Indian society but they did help to enrich the Indian culture”. Truth is far from this. If one reads the campaigns of Babur, the founder of Mogul empire, the Portuguese pacification looked like a picnic. Imperialism in other words was destructive only when the Europeans did it. When the Asians did it, it was a cultural exchange programme.

 

Such well intentioned sanitization of the past was never in the long run going to be able to withstand the awakening of the people to their history. The “secular” establishment squandered a rare opening in the early decades of the republic to heal the wound by supplying Indians a forthright accounting of the history. Had India be honest about its past- about the atrocities that were perpetrated and the heritage that was ravaged- it might have desicaated the appeal of the Hindutva supremacism. It might have reconciled Indians of their harrowing past, provoked a mature detachment from it and denied the present dispensation the opportunity to weaponize history. To come to terms with the past, to move on from it, we must first acknowledge and accept it. No Indian individual or community bears any responsibility for what happened in the precolonial era. By downplaying and denying what happened, secularists unwittingly implied otherwise.

THE FINAL PILGRIMMAGE

Yes! The childhood dream now stands fulfilled. On 23^rd Sept 2018, I witnessed Indo Pak Clash in Super 4 round of the Asia Cup.

And yet there is an underwhelming feeling to this experience. Have I seen a bit too much of Imtiaz Ali…. Manzil se Behtar lagte hain yeh Raste..... or is it the fact that India registered their biggest ever victory in ODI cricket against Pakistan in the match could be the reason…… There can be multiple reasons for this weird feeling, where I achieved what I wanted to and now I think I wish I did not achieve it. However it was a journey that I simply could not avoid

The millennials, who would have watched the last 10 years saw India and Pakistan meet  14 times and India came out at the top in 9 of them. So they would not understand the fuss about the contest. One has to confess that, one has to be above a certain age to be able to understand the rivalry of India Pakistan contest.

India became the World champions in 1983 despite having a weaker record in limited over cricket till such this date. This is both overall and head to head. To exploit the already existing hate between the two nations and their love for cricket, Sharjah  was chosen as the venue for India-Pakistan clashes, which showcased the cricketing skills of these countries in the backdrop of war-like imagery. People have argued that this literal “war minus the shooting” did immense damage to the cause of friendship between the two nations. The images of foul-mouthed, flag-waving spectators inside the stadium, being beamed live inside millions of drawing rooms in the two countries, became the new tool to prove how “hatred” for each other defines the two neighbors. Yet what cannot be forgotten is the nail biting contests that defined these battles. A last ball 6 by Miandad off Chetan Sharma actually demotivated India so much that for next 3-4 years, we could not win a contest against the arch rivals. It took almost 10 years (1997) for India to return the favor when Rajesh Chauhan hit that 6 in the last over… the venue was Karachi. Then there are other images which flash across your memory …. the Sohail send off from Prasad at Bangalore in 1996, the More Miandad kangaroo fight in Australia in 1992, the cut of Tendulkar off  Akthar 10 rows back at South Africa in 2003, the “Aaloo” that ran behind the spectator at Canada, the 314 chase in Independence Cup at Dhaka where Hrishikesh Kanitkar became a hero and I could go on and on. However the most enduring memory for me was the fear that the Pakistani players had on us. I would fear a Wasim, Waqar, even Aaqib Javed and even if India was cruising, I never felt safe because we knew the never say die attitude of Pakistan. To me that quality alone made Pakistan Pakistan.

In the last decade the balance has decisively shifted towards India. I did some number crunching and the statistics reveal what we knew

Duration	Matches	India Win	Pakistan Win	India Win %
Overall	131	54	73	41.22%
upto 2000	78	27	47	34.62%
Last 10 years	14	9	5	64.29%

Pre 2000s, India would win only 1 of the 3 matches it played. Post 2000, that ratio improves dramatically to a point that now Pakistan wins only one of the 3 matches it plays against India. However even more worrying for the Indo Pak contest are the results of last 5 matches including the one I saw yesterday

It shows not only that India has won 80% of the time in last couple of years, but it shows the contest were one sided. Even the lone Indian loss was a dramatic one sided affair.

However we need to remember that Pakistan cricket works. No team has defied odds so routinely in the history of any sport. You can, in fact, always give them good odds on defying odds. I know that doesn’t make sense, but so does the enigma of Pakistan cricket team. It seems they are on a mission of putting cricket pundits, fortune tellers and bookies out of job. Pakistan loves to lose when you back them to win and when you give them no chance, they will turn in their best performances. You bet on them at your own peril. Not sure how, but it does. It’s counter-intuitive, a bit like Quantum Physics for a layman, but there is ample proof of it around. It’s kind of weird too, it succeeds even when you think it’s laughably inept. And hence you can never ever ever ignore them. I have certain friends who despite seen this multiple times do not acknowledge this and hence they would be proven wrong. I am certain of this fact. The only thing predictable about Pakistani team is their unpredictability. Hence the admiration and the feeling of satisfaction when you see Pakistan being defeated co exist in me. 

Having said all of the above, I must admit I have this weird hate-hate relationship with Pakistan cricket. I hate it when they seem invincible. I hate it when they seem defenseless. Only a moderately successful Pakistan team keeps me at peace. But for Pakistan cricket, moderation seems haraam. 

While it was underwhelming to have witnessed the contest but as I said before, for the people above a certain age, the baggage we carried, it had to be let off. I can now die in peace! 

Yesterday with that biggest Indian Win in limited overs cricket I completed my pilgrimage. 

Jai Hind!