NDTV v/s Ten Cricket

namya — Wed, 08 Jun 2011 19:11:00 GMT

Cricket- The Republic of India

ICC - The government of India (currently The UPA)

o See no evil, hear no evil, and don't utter a single word.

BCCI - (at present) The Congress Party

Success is theirs', failure is ICC's ineptness
May have infighting and show it openly to the world too but in the end it's all in the family.
ResponSibbal to no one

IPL - Wealth of the nation

Concentrated in the hands of a few rich, powerful and well connected people.

PCB - (at present) The Opposition

No players in the IPL so don't get their share of the IPL moolah
Wants to head the ICC again but the BCCI scrapped the rotation system in the previous Lok Sabha elections
Will take every opportunity to heckle the ICC

Experts - Media

Allegiance to money and ideology; most ideologies stem out from the source of money

Spectators - Indian Citizens

No say in the running of the administration
Doesn't matter who is in power, their lives remain unchanged

This is not an exhaustive list of the parallels between the state of Cricket as a sport and the Republic of India. It is also not a political statement in the sense that the ICC in the next elections can be the NDA and the BCCI can be the RSS. The bottom line is that Cricket and India are both run like personal fiefdoms and the common man/ cricket lovers are short charged in the process.

The anger of a small minority from the civil society is being expressed in the country through the support to peaceful protests against corruption but such a possibility to rid cricket of its many challenges may be a bit ahead of its time.

This is also not a call to support any particular cause. This is a sports blog and will remain so. But the raving and ranting on TV news channels that one had to endure because of the boring ODI series made one think.

Article contributed by fakepradeepmagazine

Not Cricket's final conclusion though, is that watching BP XI playing Windies is a better alternative.

Does Pakistan really need cricketing ties with India?

namya — Wed, 07 Oct 2009 17:58:00 GMT

Finally someone had the courage to step up and ask the few million dollars question. Intikhab Alam, infuriated after alleged of being a match fixer, asked a question that needed to be asked, but for the wrong reason.

Inti (as he is intimately called it seems) was outraged because some Pakistani Parliamentarian who can't do without his daily dose of India TV or Aaj Tak or some yellow publication, threatened to call the PCB Chairman Butt (who's the butt of all jokes in the Pak team one gathers), Younis Khan (the wounded warrior) and Inti HIMSELF to appear before some committee to explain Pakistan's poor performance in their last 2 matches at the ICC Champions Trophy.

The fact that the said Mr. Dasti (the parliamentarian) seemed to have his scores to settle with Mr. Butt seems to have been lost somewhere in all this sabre rattling. Because even after claiming that he was misquoted, Jamshed Dasti stood firm on his stand against Mr. Butt.

Inti obviously loved the Indian media when he was coaching the Punjab Ranji team when all those Bhai-Bhai noises were made. But once he tasted the other, darker side of the Indian media, he wants to cut all cricketing ties with India. Was it the BCCI or any other responsible and relevant person who made such allegations? Was it an Indian player who said this? Obviously all these were rhetorical questions.

To come out and say, "The truth is that it is hard for the Indians to digest the fact that this year in two major tournaments their team, whom they tagged as favourites, was eliminated in the first round and our team not only won the Twenty20 World Cup but also reached the semifinal of the Champions Trophy," , is uncouth to put it mildly. What do you mean by Indians Mr. Alam? Are you implying that the majority of India is still stuck up about Pakistan doing well at the T20 WC and the ICC champions trophy? Maybe you can read the newspaper reports again. Not the ones that Mr. Dasti reads, obviously.

Just the other day there were reports in a Pakistani newspaper about Wasim Akram not being a part of the ESPN commentary team for the T20 Champions League. This was immediately picked up by the India media here and the BCCI and the government categorically denied that he was disallowed an Indian Visa. No one has asked cricketing ties with Pakistan to be snapped (where are the ties anyway?).

If he had a reasonable rationale to feel aggrieved about the way BCCI has treated the PCB with respect to neutral country venues, or the handling of the World Cup venue shift, one thinks he had a valid point. But generally blowing one's top on some media allegation and terming an entire country as unsporting and jealous is going over the top.

One wishes that all Pakistani politicians were as connected to the Indian media reports as Mr. Dasti was. Many more Indian citizens would be alive today.

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NDTV v/s Ten Cricket

Does Pakistan really need cricketing ties with India?