Chak De - Let it not just be flavour of the season

I'm sure the movie inspired many a blogger to come up with something. My earliest memory of the game goes back at least 20 years. My team won the Inter-class tournament way back in Class V and that was the time I seriously took up the sport. I did fairly well in the game, went on to represent my school and even played at the National level. Some of the boys against whom I played; today play for India (Gagan Ajit Singh is one example). I learnt the game Rajinder Singh, the coach of the boys team in the movie - so I guess I am fairly qualified to comment on the movie and the game.

The movie though predictable (you couldn't have us losing, could you) was thoroughly enjoyable. It gave me serious bouts of nostalgia to the extent that I was screaming foul, penalty corner, fall back & 1-2 in my head !! The movie is currently flavour of the season - but I hope it just doesn't stay that way. Lets hit the hammer while the metal is hot.

I am sure there are thousands who would have just discovered (much to their horror) that cricket is NOT the national game - it is hockey instead. Do you know that India has won 8 hockey golds in the Olympics - no other team comes remotely close. Do you know that Sansarpur, a tiny village outside Jallandhar has produced 14 Olympians. You also might know that the President of the Indian Hockey Federation is KPS Gill the supercop from Punjab.

Now you may ask what business does he have in hockey - well the same what Sharad Pawar has in Cricket and Priyaranjan Das Munshi in Football. And that is what plagues Indian sport. Our sports federations are run by people who have no skill whatsoever in the game. People, who leave alone representing the country, would have found it tough qualifying for the waterboy in their school team.

The day Gill came on board, he started treating his players as if they were recruits of the Babbar Khalsa. His autocratic ways took their toll on anyone who dared oppose him. The one person who spoke against him was sidelined and his international career brought to a premature end. Dhanraj Pillay spoke against the improper ways of the IHF post the Busan Asiad win, and he was promptly ejected from the team - where else (bar the PCB, who's chief patron is Musharraf) will you see such a thing happening?

Some of the greatest players of Indian hockey have been my mentors at some point of time or the other. Today they are content with their government flats and their kids are running the petrol pumps that were awarded to them. Ask them about giving back to the game and all you'll be staring at dejected faces and shrugged shoulders. Nobody wants to get into the muck the game has become.Nobody wants to mess with the politics.

They also laughed and cheered with us during the movie, but sadness tinges their voice when I talk to them about it. I was chatting with a former Olympian this morning, he said "Oh kuch nahi hona, lokkan ne sab bhul jaana hai, munde bahar nikal ke kirkat kheddange, hockey sirf o jaange jinna ne sarkari naukri te flat lai ke chup kar jaana hai. Eh sab drama hai - je badalna hi hai, te sab to pehlon politician nu game to kaddon - to player no khidao... fir vekho ki honda hai" (Nothing is going to happen, after the movie all of them will go back to playing cricket. The ones who play hockey are content with a flat or a government job. This is all a sham, if you want to change something then first get the politicians out of the game. Get the players to run it and then see what happens)

I just hope someone, somewhere wakes up and decides to do something about it. Thank you Chak De for giving this glimmer of hope, thank you Yashraj - you've made a worthwhile movie after a long long time.

Remember how your heart fits mine,
how your soul fits mine,
how your mind fits mine,
how your body fits mine..
You are made for me ..
angel of mine

Like a circle in a spiral
Like a wheel within a wheel
Never ending or beginning,

On an ever spinning wheel
As the images unwind
Like the circles that you find
In the windmills of your mind

(Windmills of your mind - Words and music by Alan Bergman and Michel Jean Legrand)

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Image Details:

Camera: Canon EOS 350D Digital

Lens: Canon EF-S 18 - 55 mm II

Aperture: f/5.6

Shutter Speed: 1/250 sec

Focal Length: 43mm

ISO Speed: ISO 400

Look who's talking...

There is an ongoing discussion on the Indian Railways Mailing List in which members are presenting views on load on cities' infrastructure by the growing number of immigrants from the country side - or to be more specific growing number of immigrants from UP/Bihar. Members are opposing introduction of new trains from these parts to Mumbai as it might encourage further influx.

I'm just wondering why poor UP / Bihar guys are singled out? Why is it that in most cities they are the ones blamed for most of the problems. I am not from Mumbai, but even in my hometown Delhi, the story is still the same.

Is it because most of these people are poor, live in slums, chawls or pavements (therefore mostly illegal tenements) that we consider them to be a strain on resources? Why aren't Punjabis in Delhi or Gujaratis in Mumbai considered to be a strain? Just because they live in affluent localities, drive around in flashy cars?

The garbage from the slums is easily seen, hence the people living there are considered unclean, filthy and therefore harmful to the city's general health. What about the unseen filth that flows from our drains into the sewers? These people manage by 'stealing' electricity from regular lines and hence blamed for the electricity shortage, but what about the tonnes of ACs, thousands of tube lights and other appliances that we run? Take a simple dipstick survey and it'll be clear as to who uses more electricity and water - them or us? And then we have the gall to blame them?
These people take public transport, we burn oil in our swanky cars & bikes. Who's more wasteful and a bigger strain on the city's resources?

People want to stop their influx, but pray tell me, who'll run your autos and taxis? Who will build the apartments you live in? Who will run your neighbourhood paan shop? Try asking a Punjabi or a Gujarati to do that ... and you'll get your answer.

I once asked a peon in my office as to why would he leave the village and come to the city where we lives in a single room with his wife and two kids who share the bathroom with thirty more. His answer was simple - he wanted his kids to go to a proper school, one that is not 35km away, one that has teachers and a blackboard. He wanted his kids to know what TV is, what a cinema theater is.... something he never saw as a kid.

So tell me, where does the answer lie - In preventing these people from coming to the city by force, or by creating opportunities for them nearer to home? Let's not forget our forefathers came to the city at some point just like they do now, so how is that you are right and they are wrong?