Beyond the shame of Kotla and Eden Gardens.

Home to the Best team in Test Cricket, at least for now – thanks to the Brits who pulled off a spectacular win over the Proteas yesterday.

The world’s wealthiest cricket administration body, with speculations rife about it planning to relocate the ICC headquarters to Mumbai, to suit it’s to be anointed big boss!

Home of the biggest money spinner in the game so far – the IPL – whose riches even makes the once rested cricketers to pick up their craft and has perhaps ushered in an era of players choosing between turning ‘Pros’, over wearing the national colors.

Home to some of the most decorated athletes in the game – be it a Sachin, Sunny, Kapil, Kumble, Viru or an MSD.

Most important, the craziest of fans and an even bigger TV audience, whose market size and commercial implications can outbid any number of countries put together.

Think of the flip side.

Have you ever watched a match in any of our cricket stadiums recently? Compare the viewing experience in any of our stadia to that of a beautiful Capetown or a majestic MCG or the picturesque Queenstown or the pristine Lords. Agreed, the atmosphere is definitely electric in front of a packed Eden Gardens or the knowledgeable crowd of Chepauk or the equally remarkable Brabourne stadium in our country. But, they are poles apart in game experience.

In this modern era, where a sport is also offered as an entertainment, the experience that is offered to the fans, as an end consumer, is what matters the most. Take the case of a Boxing Day test match at MCG or the great American pastime in Fenway Park or the Yankee Stadium or a ball game at Madison Square Garden – there is much more to the game and it is the magical evening experience that you pay for!

Many of our cricket stadia are nothing but concrete jungles with barbed wires separating the viewing public from the playing eleven. Almost all the stadia – including the big ones like Chepauk and Eden Gardens lack basic amenities, like clean restrooms, hygienic food and emergency safety exits. Given the security climate we are in, you are left to the mercy of the pathetic hawkers, who sell water packets and few unhealthy savouries, amidst the din created by a maddening crowd. Leave alone the fact that, it is a nightmare to even think of finding your car and your way back home through the traffic maze post a cricket match.

Coming back to the facts. Why is it so difficult for the cricket administrators of this filthy rich franchise – whose books are blessed non-accessible for any accounting norms in this country – to provide these basic sporting facilities, if not be the pioneers in game innovation?

As consumers, aren’t we entitled for any of these? But, just like anything else in this country, who cares? As proclaimed by the IPL boss himself last year, a big chunk of the revenue comes from the TV advertisement slots and who cares much about the poor sloths who venture into our stadia to watch the games?

Reason, the so called cricket boards are manned by the same corrupt politicians who rule this country. Many of them are so inept to even to tell the difference between deliveries bowled around the wicket to over the wicket. Not that you need to be an exceptional athlete in your sport to administer the affiliate – a very successful Bernie Ecclestone or a David Stern merit this argument.

BCCI has grown from couple of millions of revenue a decade ago to close to 200+ million now. Where does all this money go and what interest the politicians might have on the game, other than the luscious greenback that shrouds the game. As we saw the day before, the DDCA meeting convened to discuss the pitch fiasco was nothing more than a fist fight we see in our parliament.

What puzzles me more is this? Leave alone the hapless cricket fans of this country, who could only vent out their anger by pulling down banners and destroying the chairs in the stadium, what happened to some of the most decorated cricketers of this country?

What makes them keep mum on this sorry state of affairs of their very own breadwinner? Other than the recent Sehwag spat against the Delhi selectors, an unsuccessful rebel league from Kapil Dev and few occasional utterances from Gavaskar, none of them seem to care much. Why is it so? Who is so Big – the game, the players or the administrators? Why is it not right to question your bosses?

Unfortunately, in a country of our size with such divergence of opinion and with no dearth of issues every day, our memory is so fickle and we learn to move on. Soon, it would be ‘What happened in Delhi?’ It is this amnesia that energizes our politicians.

Silly Nationalism

So, here is the story of another Indian (by birth) winning a world acclaim and the media and a section of the Indian masses trying to latch on to any iota of 'Indianess' that might exist in Venki Ramakrishnan, to be part of that hard-earned accomplishment of the noble prize winner. Are we in such a drought of an Indian exploit, which makes us cling on to any Indianess in individual achievers across the globe?

Other than the scientific fraternity, who has had the privilege to work with the professor, how many on earth would have really known this individual till the day he won this accolade? Even by the scientist’s own claim, he had visited India very few times in the last 3 decades and that is how much amount of Indianess left in him, after having relocated to the lands of opportunity in pursuit of his dream.

May be as an individual who knows the professor or who has been associated with him or his work in some way, I would celebrate his success. How can the country take credit and be part of the success?

As the scientist himself has said it many times, let us not judge accomplishments by mere awards, for there are hundreds of other scientists who toil under the limited infrastructure at our disposal in our country and who every day wrack their brains to fight the bureaucratic and political tangles within our scientific establishments.

Given that, let us celebrate the individual's Nobel on the merits of his accomplishment as a member of the scientific fraternity and not as an 'Indian'. May be India provided the genes or the few fortunate teachers sowed the seeds of wisdom on Venki Ramakrishnan in his early school days. But, we lost that and continue to lose that privilege with the brain drain of so many individuals who migrated to greener pastures – more rightly so.

For a nation of more than a billion, there is no dearth of silly controversies and I cannot but admire the scientist’s response on nationalistic jingoism - one of the Best I have read to reinforce simple common sense!