Beruflich Dokumente
Kultur Dokumente
A 28 years drought that began 1983 and kept ending fruitlessly
every four years finally gave India , a country of close to 1.2
billion people it's moment of glory. It took our men in blues 28
years to reenact this history again. That evening of 1983
(25/06/83) at Lords and this night (02/04/11) at Wankhade is all
the same scintillating and rapturous only the time has slipped
28 years in between.
28 years ago that was one of the mediocre evenings in Howrah
when India was taking over the twice defending champion West
Indies in the world cup final at Lords. The Indian players & their
captain Kapildev had already shown some flurry of brave actions
in the previous matches which set the Indian hopes in motion
that evening.
The 55 centimeter color TV in the drawing room of Laluda's
palatial mansion's was the biggest color TV in the locality.
Getting a corner seat was next to impossible if you were not
there quite early and had no acquaintance with the Laluda's
uncle or the 8 years old Laluda's nephew.
Laluda's paternal uncle was the most powerful man in the room .
He was given the center sofa for best view. Laluda's nephew was
next to the uncle in power meter. The recalcitrant pampered boy
indifferent to the niceties of the cricket match went on jumping
& skidding around the room to the discomforts of everybody.
I was in the first year college then and was home for summer
vacation. Since I was quite late I had to be satisfied with
standing near the window but that stand too I lost during lunch
break when India completed their batting and I came home for
dinner.
Seeing me ( I had a reputation of being a good student around…)
searching for stand near the window , Laluda's uncle asked me
to come inside. Immediately a passage was created in the jam
pack hall and I was ushered near the uncle's sofa. I was feeling
more uncomfortable inside as I was not able to talk or shout
freely but on uncle's instruction I was also served tea along with
uncle. The packed room now have three VIPs.
The West Indies batting started , the first wicket was down very
quickly and then the prolific Viv. Vichards came and started
rampaging the Indian bowling.
While continuously chewing gum he was hitting the ball very
hard towards the boundary like bullets until he was caught by
Kapildev off a gem delivery from Madanlal.
That time the live telecast was coming through micro wave relay
link from UK. The transmission was suddenly stopped at around
10:00 PM and without any 'link interruption' or 'sorry message'
for half an hour the songs of Mohammed Rafi was played. Later
we came to know that it was a prescheduled program of Kolkata
Durdarshan which could not be postponed.
As the last wicket of Michel Holding was taken by Amarnath we
all stood up and roared like anything. Laluda's big drawing room
was filled with shouts and shrieks of people from all ages.
Somebody tried to stop us to look through the follow up
proceedings in the TV but we were out of bounds then.
The Indian Captain , Kapildev was holding the ICC trophy at
lords ground and champaign was spraying all around was an
enormous sight to make us feel very big & proud.
Later that night we scouted thru' the lanes and bylanes of our
locality carrying Tricolor & shouting for India. As we moved
hundreds of other joined in and the throng moved aimlessly
from one locality to the other passionately shouting for India &
Indian cricket team.
The entourage stopped sometime after 2PM.
Today after 28 years when the history is repeated I find the
same scene is reenacting only in a different time. The Laluda's
drawing room is now changed into the corporate conference hall
or the community hall where the match is shown live on big
screen.
The Uncle of Laluda is enacted by boss (or the president of your
club / community hall ) who happen to be a cricket lover. Boss'
grand son who came along with him has aptly become the
'nephew of Laluda'.
I was at the back seat , enjoying the match with others when
Uncle called me to come & sit with him at the front row.
The audience is the same ,people of all age group. Quite a few
spouses & kids too found in the gathering. Some are watching
very seriously like uncle while many others are watching at
leisure.
Teas and coffees are being served as instructed by uncle.
As the last four run came of a massive six hit by M.S Dhoni the
crowd became ecstatic and a huge roar filled in the big hall. All
including uncle started shouting & cheering up for India.
The TV show continued till after midnight . While on the road
people of all age group were shouting & running down with
Indian flags. Groups of bikers were running while cheering up
for India.
Small kids near the housing complex were shouting aimlessly to
cheer up India.
Open hooded cars were scurrying the road with kids shouting
behind the hood. The throngs of people shouting & cheering
continued till late night.
It was all together an unplanned , aimless yet passionate all
Indian show like that was enacted 28 years ago.
If the same history is repeated in another 8 , 12 , 16 or 28 years
down the time I know this same scenes will be repeated with the
same kind of actors.
This spontaneous impromptu celebration is purely the symbolic
of age old Indian culture which loves to be awed by spontaneity.
It knows no better that the expectations reduces joy. So when the
joy comes unexpected just go unplanned and be passionate to feel
it whole heartedly.
S.Bera
Powai