“Namaskar! Namaskar!”
“Kahiye, kya sunenge aap?”
“Aarey pehle yeh kahiye, Kaha thi aap?”
“Main .. Main kar rahi thi kissi ka intezaar”
“Kaun hai woh?”
“Woh .. jisse karti hoon pyaar”
“haai....”
“Aaur.. jisse karti hoon minnate bar-bar”
“Kaise?”
“Aise ...”
“Ek do teen, char paanch che saath aath nau, dus gyarah, barah tera........
The counting can go to 750,000 and some more if you are Bond or Kemar Roach not some club dancer Mohini. Actually it depends on how one takes it. Whether it is number of days for the auction to begin that you wait or how much you expect yourself to be raffled off in. Raffle it is coz may be no other term can reason for the fact that Kieron Pollard goes for the sum he may not ever know the number of zeroes in if it is converted in Indian rupees wheras Ricky Ponting had his contract bought out. And shall we talk about Paris Hilton of cricket? The fresh peacock(MORTAAZA) who is as fresh as a seawater fish you might find in Leh. Khao Piyo aish karo mitron ...and you have a multi-millionaire who is there to pay for you who does not happen to be you. If I would have been CEO of Colors, the first thing I would have done is to contract him for Bigg Boss. In two years, he must have become an expert on how to just doze around and make people talk about you. Whatte fun it is when at the back of you is a man who thinks that $650,000 are like paanch rupaiya , barah aana and whatte fun it is for that man when at the back of him is somebody all dubious. Khao piyo aish karo mitron, dil bhi kisika dukhaya to hota hai kya. But I just sometime wonder whether ever any of them feels like what Rani Mukherjee from Mangal Pandey did in that single most remarkable moment from the movie when she was about to be auctioned off. Utha kar dikhaoon kya?? I wonder whether any of them have been unfortunate enough to have actually seen the movie.
Also recently I read a prominent stakeholder from Rajasthan Royals say that he expects a 300% increase in ticket sales this season. 300%!!! Not taking into account NRIPL2, that means that the sales of tickets in IPL1 were 1/3rd of what they expect now. Now since it is BCCI the likelihood of them having increased seating capacity threefold in 2 years is as likely as this post getting more than 10 views , it means that IPL 1 was a big flop for RR with only 1/3rd of seat occupation. Since IPL is IPl, we know that is not true so, 300% increase!!!! They must have figures out a way like teaching birds and monkeys cricket. We have intelligent people here mate for IPL!!!! Like people who claim that organising a test match gives more returns than a T20 coz a test collects eyeballs for 5 days whereas a T20 for 3 hours or a bit more if you add Extra Innings with Mandira Bedi in it!!!! Isn’t it a bit like saying I can score 100% in an examination if I score 20% in 5 different subjects? Due to the intelligence of the same like-minded people I suppose we are going to have 2 tests in the same time that we are going to have 2 IPLs. See the equation . Equal isn’t it ?
Simply put, I do not feel right when Dravid’s captaincy is snatched to give it to a stud because he did not do a Lambu Atta to a Malla, “ Maalya, tune mujhe paise diye hain. Mujhe chod de, main tere liye bh*rw*a ban jaoonga. Main Tujhe chaukke-chakke supply karoonga aur tu maje lena . Aur agar main aisa nahi kar paaya to mujhe fire mat karna , mujhe cheel-chaal kar chakka bana de, tujhe chahiye to chakke hi.” Disgusting!!!! And I do not feel right when a P Dogra almost becomes a bigger star than Sachin coz in a match he smashes a G Satish for 2 sixes and 2 fours in an over in which Sachin score just 17. I do not feel right coz it makes my favourite player VVS forget that he has got a joint between his arms and palms called wrists and that he is playing cricket not golf. I do not feel right when after having his eyeballs popped out on seeing the huge prices plyers went for in IPL auction one of my uncles exclaimed to his pregnant wife,” Main apne bête ko cricketer banoonga.” Hope he grows to be a Ranchod Das. I do not feel right coz it makes the end the be all and the end all. I do not feel right coz it makes people like Lalit Modi believe that they can make a baseball-ized form of cricket popular in America. And I do not feel right coz may be he will. That for me will be the second time cricket will die. The first will be obviously when Sachin retires.
Can Ipl be like premier league as is envisaged by Modi? I doubt that will happen till the time Sachin retires form IPL. Coz he is one man who is greater than the game in India. Sample this , in a game last year , everybody save one in my hostel common room was cheering Malinga when he was up facing Rajat Bhatia last season . And my college is in Delhi. Do I need tell anyone why? When Rooney left Everton for Man Utd, I doubt if any of Everton supporter started cheering Man Utd in a Mu-Everton match. In BPL, there are clubs, here there are players. Secondly , suppose I come from Bihar, what team do I cheer for? In Uk, every Tom , Dumb and Harry has a team to cry hoarse for. And “Don” thinks that he will rectify that by creating new teams like Bihari Baboos and UP’s Bhaiyaas. But he will make me hate it even more for the reasons stated above.
But Ipl is not a can of worms. It gives a 22 year old rookie player an opportunity to have an apartment in a locality in one year in which Sachin took ten to have one. No one should grudge him that. If Rooney can be a multi-millionaire at 21, it gives at least them a chance to feel that India is not a third-world country anymore. Because of this may be a player who is good enough for only U-19 or so and not at par to be selected for national team will not commit suicide. Cricket is a religion in India and there are droves of youngsters who follow it like none other exists. And there are only 15 spots up for grabs . National or Ranji.. It can kindle the hope into a lot of youngsters from cricketing backwaters that someday they can make the graduation from bat-ball khela to cricket game. What Ipl does is not only it provides them hope for good money but also good opportunity. Few industries in India do so. And that is what pains me – Cricket is fast turning into an industry. But that gives rise to a multi-million dollar question- How will a bread infected with fungus taste to you if you have not eaten anything for 10 days? Will you go for taste or your life? And it gives rise to a billion dollar question- Why did we allow to come things to this?
So here I am, I might hate it , but can’t ignore it. I might feel that a plenty of matches are fixed given the way DC crumpled against KKR with their batsmen suddenly starting to play tennis instead of cricket. Will they have played the same shots if they had turned out in their national colours? There are doubts aplenty , but that does not stop me to have a peep inside the common room whenever I cross by. And invariably it is IPL playing. I wish I could say Let the magic begin, but I will have to settle for Let the Tamasha begin.
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