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Time is ripe for Indo-Pak bilateral cricketing ties: Kapil
India, June 22: Kapil Dev, India`s finest all-round cricketer, believes the government should decide whether bilateral cricketing ties with Pakistan should be resumed. In most circumstances, such support would be considered illogical. After all, what has sport got to do with the government?
India, June 22: Kapil Dev, India's finest all-round cricketer,
believes the government should decide whether bilateral cricketing
ties with Pakistan should be resumed. In most circumstances, such
support would be considered illogical. After all, what has sport got
to do with the government?
Kapil Dev has a point. There can be no normal sport in an abnormal situation just as no normal sport was possible in the abnormal society that South Africa was under apartheid. And since the Kargil war in 1999, Kapil has been consistent in his stated opposition to cricket ties with the prickly neighbour. If the matter were to be left to the cricket board, its president would probably arrange a 10-match preliminary series in fields as far flung as Abu Dhabi, Birmingham, Cuttack, Dhaka, Tangiers and Zimbabwe with a best of five final to be played at the Eden Gardens under lights. The board might just baulk at Baghdad, with Colin Powell as the match adjudicator, as the ultimate venue for the final of all finals to host the cricket for peace cup. But that's because it's money the cricket boards are interested in, not great national causes. True, sports organisations should be independent of government. It should be more so in the case of cricket which is not financially beholden to governments in Asia. But the board motive in wishing to revive relations with Pakistan is primarily commercial. Even shared cultural interests come in a distant second.
Kapil stresses that national interest should be placed above idealistic principles like sport being free to be played where it pleases. There too he may be right because generals have been known in the past to use cricket as a tool to mock at India as Gen. Zia often did.
The former Pakistani ruler would be lavish in gifts like carpets to Indian cricketers as his way of trying to win diplomatic wars. He once invited himself to a test match at Jaipur while pretending that he wished to discuss trade and bilateral relations in New Delhi on the way home.
A meeting in the world cup once in four years, mostly on neutral ground, has helped preserve the mystique that cricket between Asian neighbours generates. And since security is generally someone else's headache in such matches, it has suited the Asian countries which would otherwise get into such a lather over 'security' that cricket would not really be about sport.
Bureau Report
Kapil Dev has a point. There can be no normal sport in an abnormal situation just as no normal sport was possible in the abnormal society that South Africa was under apartheid. And since the Kargil war in 1999, Kapil has been consistent in his stated opposition to cricket ties with the prickly neighbour. If the matter were to be left to the cricket board, its president would probably arrange a 10-match preliminary series in fields as far flung as Abu Dhabi, Birmingham, Cuttack, Dhaka, Tangiers and Zimbabwe with a best of five final to be played at the Eden Gardens under lights. The board might just baulk at Baghdad, with Colin Powell as the match adjudicator, as the ultimate venue for the final of all finals to host the cricket for peace cup. But that's because it's money the cricket boards are interested in, not great national causes. True, sports organisations should be independent of government. It should be more so in the case of cricket which is not financially beholden to governments in Asia. But the board motive in wishing to revive relations with Pakistan is primarily commercial. Even shared cultural interests come in a distant second.
Kapil stresses that national interest should be placed above idealistic principles like sport being free to be played where it pleases. There too he may be right because generals have been known in the past to use cricket as a tool to mock at India as Gen. Zia often did.
The former Pakistani ruler would be lavish in gifts like carpets to Indian cricketers as his way of trying to win diplomatic wars. He once invited himself to a test match at Jaipur while pretending that he wished to discuss trade and bilateral relations in New Delhi on the way home.
A meeting in the world cup once in four years, mostly on neutral ground, has helped preserve the mystique that cricket between Asian neighbours generates. And since security is generally someone else's headache in such matches, it has suited the Asian countries which would otherwise get into such a lather over 'security' that cricket would not really be about sport.
Bureau Report