মেঘমুলুকে

উড়োজাহাজে চড়ার অভিজ্ঞতা আমার এই প্রথম। আর তাই মনে প্রশ্ন জাগে, কবিরা কি প্লেনে চড়েনা? তাহলে সেই অজানা অদেখা অদ্ভূত সুন্দর জগৎ নিয়ে কোনো কবিতা নেই কেনো? প্রযুক্তির সাহায্য নিয়ে সুন্দরের অন্বেষণ করাটা কি তাদের কাছে গ্রহণযোগ্য নয়? নিশ্চই কেউ লিখে থাকবে, আমার জ্ঞানের সীমাবদ্ধতা আমাকে জানতে দেয় নি। শুধু জানি যে সেই মুলুকের রূপের ছটা আমায় বাকরুদ্ধ করে দিয়েছিল। মেঘের মধ্যে দিয়ে যাবার সময় নিচে থেকে দেখা আস্তরণ ধোঁয়ায় রূপান্তরিত হয়। আর যখন সেই বাষ্পের জাল ছিন্ন করে ওপরে উঠে এলে ‌‌: সাদা পেঁজা তুলোর দিগন্তলীন ব্যাপ্তি, আর কত রকম যে তার কারুকায। কোথাও ফুটে উঠেছে এক মস্ত ব্যাঙের ছাতা, কোথাও বা পর্বতমালা, কোথাও ঢেউ খেলানো শুভ্র সমুদ্র। ওপরে পরিষ্কার নীল আকাশ ঝলমল করছে সূর্যালোকে, আর তার প্রভায় প্রজ্জ্বলিত এই মেঘলোক। বহু যূগ আগে কোনো দেবদূত যদি আমাকে এই অচেনা জগৎ দেখাতো, আমি কি ভাবতাম না যে এটাই স্বর্গ?
আর যখন সূর্যাস্ত হয়, তখন স্বর্গ‌‌ নরক মিলে মিশে একাকার। মেঘসমুদ্রের ঢেউ গুলির একদিকে দূরে কোথাও জ্বলতে থাকা আগুনের প্রভা, আর অন্যদিকে জমতে থাকা অন্ধকার। গোধূলীলগ্নের আকাশ, আমি ভেসে যাচ্ছি পুবে আমার মাতৃভূমির উদ্দেশ্যে, আর আকাশের রঙ ক্ষণেক্ষণে গাঢ়তর হচ্ছে। দিগন্তে আগুনের রেখা ক্ষিণ হয়ে আসছে, উপরে তারারা একেএকে দেখা দেয়, আর মেঘলোক বাইরের পুঞ্জিভূত আঁধারে মিলিয়ে যায়।

Crossroad of history

For the last few days i am in one of the many places through which the crossroads of hisory have passed. The Special Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) campus is situated in the mountains of the northern Caucasus, in a part of the Russian Federation known as the Karachay-Cirkassian Republic. And a thousand years ago, this place was the rich thriving nation of Alania, the land of the Alans. Alan being the local form of the word aryan. This place has seen an imaginable amount of flux, throughout history. Alania was on the ancient Silk route. At this time of the year, in the mountains the green is interspaced with yellow, brown and red. How amazed an Indian or Chinese merchant must have been, a thousand summers ago, when they stepped in the valley, on their way to Byzantium. The Silk Route made this place rich, and wealth brought problems with it. There were civil wars, invasions by the Huns and later the Mongols. The ravaged nation could not rise up after the Mongols faded, as change had come in climate and civilization. Drought in central Asia changed the route through which silk and pepper passed into Europe. And now there were ships.

Still generations survived rather contentedly in these pristine valleys. Legend has it that everyone lives more than hundred years in these mountains. But in the middle of the nineteenth century came Tsarist Russia and brought war and mass exodus of Circassians, although the Karachay were spared. A century later though under Stalin's orders there were mass deportations to the north, ethnic tensions between the Christians and Muslims were ignited. Oh the same 'divide and rule' policy that we Indians are so painfully aware of. USSR is gone, the wheel of time has taken care of it like other proud empires. But the mountains are still abalze. Wars happened in Abkhazia to the west, Chechnia to the east, and Georgia to the south. But i guess the people here have learned long ago, like in India, that somehow life goes on, and there is always beauty to be found, not on the highways but in the bylanes of life.

my All-time Indian Test XI

Openers

About the first name there can be no debate. The man who gave Indian batsmanship it's spine, the first Indian cricketer who could realistically be called the best in the world, the original 'little master' finished his career holding most of the records in the game. India's best captain till date without doubt was Sourav Ganguly. But since I have gone the Australian way of choosing the best XI and then appointing the most eligible among these as the captain, it must be Gavaskar. The only other man in the team with a better win/loss ratio than him as captain is M. S. Dhoni, but it's too soon to judge Dhoni as a captain. Gavaskar was a defensive captain because the times demanded it, as India then rarely had an intrusive bowling attack. But with the team given to him below, he will surely be more fearless.
India's poor record in test cricket mainly stems from three reasons, lack of solid openers, good allrounders, and quality pace bowlers. The choices over the years are pretty limited in these three categories. The only other name which can be up for consideration as opener is probably that of Vijay Merchant, who was a colossus of his time. Syed Mushtaq Ali and Krishnamachari Srikant were both too impetuous. Veenu Mankad has been considered in the allrounders category. Surely Sehwag surpasses all other Indian openers in his deeds as a batting match winner, a very hard task to achieve in test cricket where drawing is always an option, as also his record. It's time we accepted Sehwag as one of India's all-time greats.

1. SM Gavaskar (C)
Span Mat Runs HS BatAv 100 Wkts BBI BowlAv 5 Ct St
1971-1987 125 10122 236* 51.12 34 1 1/34 206.00 0 108 0

2. V Sehwag
Span Mat Runs HS BatAv 100 Wkts BBI BowlAv 5 Ct St
2001-2009 69 5757 319 50.06 15 29 5/104 43.62 1 55 0

Middle order

These are the toughest choices to make, for in the post-Vishwanath era India has produced a plethora of star batsmen who played in the positions three to six. Barring Gundappa Vishwanath, whom Gavaskar rated as better than himself, the great batsmen who could not make the cut just because of the limited number of places available include Mohinder Amarnath, Dileep Vengsarkar, Mohammad Azharuddin, Sourav Ganguly and VVS Laxman. Add to that the stalwarts of yesteryears: Lala Amarnath (India's first centurion), Vijay Manjrekar, Polly Umrigar, and Tiger Pataudi.
The three people finally chosen are not only the best India has produced, but probably some of the best batsmen the world has ever seen. Vijay Hazare may come as a surprise for people with scant knowledge of cricket history, but he was head and shoulders above other Indian batsmen of his generation.

3. R Dravid
Span Mat Runs HS BatAv 100 Wkts BBI BowlAv 5 Ct St
1996-2009 134 10823 270 52.53 26 1 1/18 39.00 0 184 0

4. SR Tendulkar
Span Mat Runs HS BatAv 100 Wkts BBI BowlAv 5 Ct St
1989-2009 159 12773 248* 54.58 42 44 3/10 51.63 0 102 0

5. VS Hazare
Span Mat Runs HS BatAv 100 Wkts BBI BowlAv 5 Ct St
1946-1953 30 2192 164* 47.65 7 20 4/29 61.00 0 11 0

Allrounders

Very few choces over the years. But the two people who stand out are so great, that there was hardly any way they could be left out. Even the mythical "came off the pitch like the crack of doom" Amar Singh could not make it, mainly because we already have a decent seam bowling option in Hazare, though it was quite tempting to keep India's legendary opening duo of bowlers together since Nissar is in the XI. Two other notable exclusions are Dattu Phadkar and Salim Durrani, both of whom probably didn't fully utilize their prodigious talents.
To fit the two giants chosen as allrounders, the middle order, one strength of Indian cricket through the years, had to be curtailed to only three places. But I am sure the team is now much more balanced.

6. MH Mankad
Span Mat Runs HS BatAv 100 Wkts BBI BowlAv 5 Ct St
1946-1959 44 2109 231 31.47 5 162 8/52 32.32 8 33 0

7. N Kapil Dev
Span Mat Runs HS BatAv 100 Wkts BBI BowlAv 5 Ct St
1978-1994 131 5248 163 31.05 8 434 9/83 29.64 23 64 0

Wicketkeeper

India has produced decent glovemen from Janardan Navle (the first keeper), Budhi Kunderan to Nayan Mongia (kept admirably to the spinners on Indian dust-bowl pitches during the 90s). The two other heavyweight contenders for the spot were Farokh Engineer and Syed Kirmani. In terms of batting Dhoni beats Engineer in consistency, and Kirmani in the average. If you look at dry statistics only, he has a better catches/stumpings per match record than either, so he must be really good at his primary job, that of keeping wickets. He is also a choice for the future, with the potential to become one of the world's all-time greats, as also India's greatest captain.

8. MS Dhoni (wk)
Span Mat Runs HS BatAv 100 Wkts BBI BowlAv 5 Ct St
2005-2009 37 1962 148 37.73 1 0 - - 0 92 18

Spinners

Another category where one is spoilt for choice. Ghulam Ahmed, Subhas Gupte, Bapu Nadkarni, Jasu Patel, Bishan Singh Bedi, Bhagwat Chandrasekhar, Srinivas Venkataraghavan, Ravi Shastri (though more correctly should be considered one of India's rare allrounders), Harbhajan Singh, it's quite a list. The only entry from the legendary spin quartet of the 70s is probably the best of them, though Bedi misses out because the team already has a very decent left arm orthodox spinner in Veenu Mankad. Prasanna's record would have been far better if he didn't take a five year hiatus to finish his engineering degree, and also if the umpires in that era were more lineant (towards the bowler) with the LBW rule whereby a batsman can be given out even though he is hit on the pads outside the line of off stump when he is not offering a shot. The Pakistanis ended his career in 1979 using this tactic.
India's greatest matchwinner was more or less an automatic choice. The proverbial go-to man for any captain, Kumble thoroughly deserves his place as the best among India's spinning best.

9. A Kumble
Span Mat Runs HS BatAv 100 Wkts BBI BowlAv 5 Ct St
1990-2008 132 2506 110* 17.77 1 619 10/74 29.65 35 60 0

10. EAS Prasanna
Span Mat Runs HS BatAv 100 Wkts BBI BowlAv 5 Ct St
1962-1978 49 735 37 11.48 0 189 8/76 30.38 10 18 0

Pacer

One category where there is a paucity of choices, although things seem to be improving of late and a person doing this exercise ten years hence may not have to search hard for suitable candidates. The best post-partition pacer we produced has already been included (Kapil Dev).

Although the Pakistanis will claim Nissar happily as their own, since India as a test nation is still forced to carry the baggage of the dismal record of the All India test teams before partition, we should be able to stake claim on the people who played in those teams. Nissar was probably the fastest bowler India has ever produced. Our first captain CK Nayudu once claimed that he was faster than Harold Larwood (of the bodyline fame) on his day. The only other realistic contender for this place was Javagal Srinath, an unsung great of Indian cricket.

11. M Nissar
Span Mat Runs HS BatAv 100 Wkts BBI BowlAv 5 Ct St
1932-1936 6 55 14 6.87 0 25 5/90 28.28 3 2 0

In case the team needs a substitute fielder, one surely ones Solkar to come in, especially with three quality spinners in the line up. A legend in his own right, the success of the spin quartet in the 70s has a lot to do with this man fielding at short leg, picking up catches from near the batsman's shoelaces. The other contender was Mohammad Azharuddin.

12th man: ED Solkar (1969-1977, Mat 27, Ct 53)

The Team: A fire and ice opening combination, followed by a rock solid but stylish middle order. Two allrounders who can either consolidate or play their shots. A wicketkeeping batsman who can do the same. Opening bowlers with pace and swing. Three great spinners, widely divergent in their bowling styles, but persistent and deadly. At least three back-up seam and spin bowlers. A substitute fielder who can hold on to any catch. An astute captain to lead them. A team for the ages.

UPDATE (14th September 2010)
My choice was identical but for the fast bowler's slot to that of the jury from cricinfo (link below)! Time to pat myself on the back, well done me.
Cricinfo All-Time Indian XI
More importantly for me, Ramachandra Guha's XI (same link as above) has the exact same bowling attack as mine, the only difference in the XI being Kirmani instead of Dhoni and Colonel Naidu instead of Hazare. And I have no problem accepting that his choices are better than mine.

for Vincentians (of Asansol), from around the turn of the century

Memories are one's own, maybe sweetened while looking through the sepia tinted glasses of nostalgia. But some of them can be shared, confident that they will find resonance in the hearts of those who were there, while the events that shaped them took place. Wonder how many of you remember that in junior school we were mad about shaking Brother MacPhillamy's hands. And he always obliged with a smile. The swimming pool water smelled of chlorine, is it still the same? Utsav Mitra was the fastest runner we had and he started the 4X100 m relay. Our personal inabilities in the track and field didn't stop us from basking in the glory of the relay team's victories over Pats. Wonder if Utsav will ever read this. For class picnics would invariably end up in Shatabdi Park or Lawmeyer's Park, though I do fondly remember our trip to Maithan dam when I was in high school. The loss of those small green field behind the two big ones still rankle. They were sold off during our time, Brother Christopher's reign. and we still don't know why. Wonder how many times we had to sing "London Bridge is falling down" during our singing classes in junior school? Do you remember the kites which circled the skies above in constant vigilance? One of them once snatched my tiffin box off my hands! Still remember running after it, squinting my eyes against the sunlight trying to follow it's movements ... till it dropped the empty box. The little chapel in the middle school building was beautiful, though I had the chance of going inside it only a couple of times. The books in the library were plentiful. I am sure many of us will be grateful for all the flights of fancy our thoughts were encouraged to undertake, as a result of reading stories from a tender age. Are the green billiards tables still there? What about Debu Bhattacharya's den? It was a dark and surreal place, he was like a wizard cooking up contraptions which us mortals had the chance of seeing only once a week. The classrooms, the wooden desks, the gardens, the asphalted roads, the green fields, the pebble strewn stretches, the concrete handball courts ... the smells and the colours ... the memories ...

Sportainment

We know it was always true. The modern phenomena of competitive sports is nothing more than a spectacle to entertain the masses, another brand of opium for them sometimes even more effective than religion. But cricket aficionados have always tried to romanticize the sport and assign greater meaning to the antics of the "flannelled fools". Here is one proof that breaks the illusion, and shows sports for what it is.