What does the IPL pull out mean for Indian sport? Are we headed the Pakistan way? Is this the road to perdition for India as a host of international sporting events? In the short term yes, but in the long term, I guess the answer is in the negative. I agree that bolstering the security apparatus during the elections gained primacy over everything else including a cricket jamboree, but I can’t help but think that the event was short circuited for political reasons.
Lalit Modi’s proximity to erstwhile Rajasthan chief minister Vasundra Raje is well known. As are NCP strongman Sharad Pawar’s deep rooted problems with the Congress. In poll season, that is a potent combination. But is that the whole truth and nothing but the unadulterated truth. Only the other day, I heard from a reliable stakeholder that Rajasthan CM Ashok Ghelot had promised security cover for the IPL in his state. The stakeholder even told me that he had personally seen a letter to this effect. So, if this was the case, then why did Modi, Pawar and Co take the tournament away? Was there an element of brinkmanship involved. Tit for tat.
We know that Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani, also owner of Mumbai Indians met home minister P Chidambaram at the height of the drama and asked for an honourable resolution, but to no avail. There was even a story doing the rounds that when a deadlock loomed large on the radar – Sharad Pawar was drafted in to meet PM Dr Manmohan Singh on this prickly issue. The strong polarisation between the Congress and BJP on the IPL was thrown into stark relief very early on when BJP CMs rallied around Modi and offered him venues in double quick time. That Pawar was reportedly denied a meeting with the PM convinced Modi and Co to take the tournament to a new home. That is why one saw an aggressive ‘charitable institution’ – the BCCI – take on the government on a Sunday, unilaterally moving the event out of India. The Indian Premier League in South Africa. Somewhere, the ambitious Modi, some even call him arrogant, realised that the tournament was bigger than everything else. The BCCI, always a private club was telling the government where to get off the bus. Ha, ha! There was no logic in this move. Translated it only meant that it is a zero sum game for the country.
In a smoke and mirrors strategy, Modi said England and quietly did the deal with South Africa. Modi walked his walk and talked his talk and glibly came through once again as an organiser of great sagacity and skill. Cricket’s marquee event is now the envy of many, it has found takers all over the world. Modi has proved his point, but think of the damage done to Indian sport. I am very clear that the home ministry used political vendetta as the sole arbiter on the IPL. You can argue that it didn’t have any choice. After all think of what would happen to the ruling party if something untoward were to happen mid way during the elections? Sadly there was no sophistication or subtlety shown by either side in this logjam. Cricket is the loser. India is the loser with this pull out. Rumblings of discontent were heard even before one could say IPL as the nervous Aussies stated that they won’t play their Davis Cup tie in Chennai.
India has always been safe. India is not Pakistan or for that matter Sri Lanka or Bangladesh. Sachin Tendulkar says he feels safest in India. I do too. What is the message that one is sending to the rest of the world? That India cannot look after the security of a sporting event of this magnitude? India hosts the hockey World Cup next year in Delhi, it also stages the Commonwealth Games in the same city in October 2010. Tennis Australia’s missive to the International Tennis Federation is a wake up call for the Indian establishment – political and sporting. In any case nine times out of 10, they are one and the same thing, run by the same people who inhabit both worlds – government and sporting associations. The Davis Cup tie to be held between May 8 and 10 has run into a security wall. Aussie number one Lleyton Hewitt raised concerns first and struck a chord with Tennis Australia. While the AITA has suggested that the Davis Cup will be held in the same venue as the ATP event in January and the players will use the same hotel where the ATP event participants stayed, Tennis Australia is not completely convinced. Question mark remains. Round two to politics.
The shadow of doubt. This element of uncertainty can spook people. Terrorism is a way of life. New York, London, Bali, Mumbai have all faced terror attacks varying in scale and in magnitude. All of them have left the world shaken and dismayed. But yet people continue to travel to these distant destinations. Life goes on. Who could have imagined that the World Trade Centre twin towers would be taken out in a daring and audacious attack? Who could have imagined that terrorists would come by dinghy and take hostages in two of Mumbai’s iconic hospitality structures? But both events did take place. A heightened security environment is necessary in such a dismal age. But that doesn’t mean that India is not safe. India is as safe as any other western nation. India had a great opportunity to project that it is safe and secure by staging the IPL concurrently with the elections. Politicos probably didn’t want electioneering and polling to be impacted by cricket matches. If people only concentrate on cricket, who will come and listen to us and vote for us seems such a simplistic thinking? But it may well be true. For politicians think differently.
If security alone was the reason for not holding the IPL, then full credit to the government for they are sanitising and securing our lives. If cricket has come under the cosh because of petty politics, then it is a pity. If Lalit Modi, Sharad Pawar and Co were to be cut to size and shown their place, then it is another matter. When Pawar lost to Jagmohan Dalmiya in the the BCCI presidentship elections, it was an unthinkable event. Pawar had never lost an election. The machinations of the Congress party satraps was being dicussed in hushed tones even then. This time, he declared his prime ministerial ambitions and found himself a pariah all over again. I wonder how one can become PM with 11 or 12 MPs. Prima facie you cannot. But stranger things have happened in Indian politics in the last 20 years – Inder Kumar Gujral, H D Deve Gowda, Chaudhary Charan Singh and Chandrashekhar being notable exceptions to that theorem.
Sport is above politics. Unless Pakistan is involved. But then Pakistan is a rogue state. Let it stay that way. Till the Americans decide to clean it up. Although it looks increasingly difficult to control the Pushtuns there. Let us not hurtle like Pakistan into a cul de sac from which we cannot extricate ourselves. India is not Pakistan. For God’s sake we know that. There is a lot of nationalistic prestige associated with staging a big ticket sporting event. Soviet Union, USA and China have confirmed this notion in the past with the Olympics. India is positioning itself as an economic and military superpower. A regional force. It stages the Commonwealth Games for the very first time, let us not botch it up by sending out the wrong signals.
