Indian Cricket's lost voice

Much due to the abundance of time, I got the chance to keenly follow the spot-fixing and the subsequent betting scandal that rocked Indian cricket just a few weeks back. Although I must admit that my observations, opinions and ideas stem out of all that I have been able to notice through limited proximity, which many would consider superficial, I can’t help but write about certain things that have stood out in all this chaos. While I do agree that a sports journalist would be in a better position to comment on all of this, but as an honest fan my job is at times to view things beyond the colored lenses of fervor and that of passion. At times, the romance can indeed wait.

There’s a lot that can be written about the spot-fixing, about governance, about regulating player behavior, about this and about that – in fact, a lot has been talked about on television and in print. Often rhetoric, sensational and speculative, the discussions have reached a saturation point. It is largely agreeable that some kind of public discourse and debate must take place to take stock of affairs at present. But key to that debate or discourse is a voice that is missing today. I am talking of a voice sans any agenda.

It just saddens me when I see former cricketers and the current day cricket commentator talk of IPL as though nothing is wrong about it whatsoever. Forget the broadcaster’s lack of understanding of public perception when it chose to ignore the magnanimity of the situation that arose out of these scandals. But our trusted voices, what about them? Surely they could’ve discussed it on air, a few words maybe?

We absolutely love it when words like ‘tracer-bullet’, ‘Karbonn Kamaal’, ‘Double Ds’ and ‘Double Rs’ ring through our TV sets, but our silence, which in most cases is mistaken for our ignorance and nonchalance, became evident in a never-seen-before manner. The Indian cricket fan was angry, for sure he was. But no-one tried to assuage him. The Indian fan will remain loyal, no matter what is something our administrators are too used to by now, which is exactly the feeling that has seeped into the systems of the respectable faces and voices that I am talking of here. Of course, the loyalty of the fan was evident when stadiums were still filled and boundaries were cheered, but it was also evident when the President of the cricket board was booed. The message was clear, we are here because we love the game and that is it. The filled stadiums and the long queues did give the wrong signals. It was as though the public was shielded from all kinds of malice that was going on out there. But it is partly untrue because the average Indian cricket fan still comes from a background where being able to afford a cricket ticket is a big thing and attending a match is still an inherent part of his self-actualization. Let us not mistake it for the fact that he is very happy with what the condition is.

Coming back to the whole point about voices, it is time that the likes of Gavaskar, Bhogle and Shastri speak out. And quite openly at that. Yes, a lot of columns have been written, views have been aired and defenses vehemently presented – but to me, they all seem to be a desperate attempt to tell the world that their silence hasn’t been bought, which in fact is the scenario. Over tweets and in interviews, Bhogle and Gavaskar have agreed to the fact that they are contracted to the BCCI. Shastri, quite famous for his aggressive stand on match referee Mike Denness during India’s South Africa tour in 2001 and his staunch defense of India’s views on DRS (which led to an altercation with fellow commentator, Naseer Hussain), has surprisingly not even murmured a word. It simply saddens me that I grew up in a time where it was just a treat to watch Gavaskar, Bhogle and Shastri sitting together in a single panel on ESPN-Star and that today I simply can’t help but doubt their credibility when they speak a single word. Either those very people standing up for Harbhajan Singh, during Monkey-gate just a few years back, have lost all sense of timing or they now have their own agendas of self preservation in mind, a question that I may very well ask.

The confused fan needs to be reassured and comforted. And at times, told of what the scenario is actually like. This role is well suited for former cricketers on whom they have had tremendous faith. Journalists, rightly or wrongly, are often considered to be story-seeking, TRP-driven mongrels, so why not cut them some slack and let them do what they do best i.e. report? Why not shift the burden of explanations, and that of asking questions, to our legends, which include the captain of our cricket team?

MS Dhoni is the Vice President of the company which owns his IPL franchise whose Team Principal, in turn, happens to be behind bars. In the current scenario, you can’t expect more than a tilted smile to uncomfortable questions, and much like the commentators, he has too many strings attached to those running the sport in our country today. Contrast this with the 2000 match-fixing scandal and Sourav Ganguly, the then newly appointed captain, told the fan that his players were clean and would do anything to bring glory to the country. The least Dhoni could do (which Ganguly himself pointed out) is to say in explicit terms something like – ‘Yes, I know you are hurt. I can empathize, I promise you that my boys and I will do anything we can to win the Champions Trophy and bring back joy…’

Kirti Azad has been protesting against the IPL since day one, and even if he has honest intentions in mind, I simply see his views as personal agenda and that of the ‘I-told-you-so’ brigade. Kapil Dev, someone closely linked to the match-fixing saga that happened last time around and someone who often complains of being victimized, has not condemned it in a way that the message would be loud and clear. Anil Kumble has been non-committal on the issue, despite sharing the twin roles of a legendary cricketer and the President of a state cricket association. The only inference that I can get from that is that he is too happy with all the perks that he is getting currently by not questioning the BCCI (read: Chief, BCCI Technical Head and Chief, ICC Cricket Committee). The only statement that came out from his end was that of stripping Sreesanth off all his medals.

Laxman has spoken and so have Dravid, Tendulkar and Ganguly. Beyond those over-clarifying and, to a point, blatantly pretentious tweets from some of the ‘reputable voices’, I see a lot of hope in these four pillars of Indian cricket. What they need is a united front, where they can say that enough is enough, clean up the mess. I am sure that they are in a position to do so; all four of them have ended their careers, have a combined bank balance that can afford an IPL team, have records that most cricketers can only dream of and do not require any back-patting approvals from the BCCI, leave alone a provident fund. It’s time that they talk a little about the destruction of the monument they built so painstakingly, that of a new and successful image of Indian Cricket.