Indian Society and IPLGate

I heard one of the more interesting conversations about IPLGate on Cricinfo. Harsha Bhogle, Sanjay Manjrekar and Ayaz Memon made some extremely valuable points there. But the point that really stuck with me was made by Sanjay Manjrekar. He said "I wish for the benefit of India cricket that Indian cricket fans didn't love the game so unconditionally. I wish they were more demanding".

It was an absolutely awesome statement. Two of Indias finest nicities are they they are not very demanding and they are extremely forgiving. It almost comes to a point where some people have started exploiting these virtues. India finds itself in unprecedented times today. The growing economy, the wealth, the importance and the belief that the times ahead promise much more are something that hadn't happened anytime before. There is a tremendous sense of achievement and confidence. However, there are some attributes passed on from previous generations that haven't gone away.

My parents generation was the first one after India's independence. It was probably a time when most of the country had indulged itself (knowingly or unknowingly) in nation-building. Government had tons and tons of work to do. And thats why Government jobs were abundant. Having a Government job was the norm, in fact prestigous. It came with decent salaries and most importantly security. However, poverty and simple livelihood were pretty common. And since people didn't have too many resources at their disposal they were not very demanding. They didn't need everything to be perfect. They were happy to just enjoy whatever they had rather than worry about what they didn't. This in turn makes people more forgiving as well.

Compare this to an American or European society where people have been well to do for generations. They've almost got used to things being just perfect and therefore anything other than perfect draws a lot of ire. For e.g. Indian roads haven't been in the greatest of shapes for years (they've improved now). But that didn't make people pelt stones or burn effigies of the concerned officers. Compare this to an incident where an American freeway has some pothole. Police with immediately shutdown the freeway (or at least that lane) till the time it is made perfect.

But this will change. The India of today is rich, glamorous and is getting used to things being perfect. They can afford a better lifestyle and are getting used to it. I don't think newer generations of Indians would want to go to an ordinary cinema hall once they've been to a multiplex. And once this better lifestyle becomes the norm everywhere, it will mean that people strive to get the best of everything.

So if an IPLGate happens again in a few years, people will not be that forgiving. It will take a lot of effort to win their confidence back. But till then, let's just hope that controversies such as these are few and far between.

-Shri

IPLGate: "Na deshyudh, na dharmayudh... ye hai dharti par karmayudh"

The Indian Premier League started as this colossus of entertainment. It was the perfect mashup of cricket, India's biggest infatuation along with Bollywood, glitz, glamour and huge sums of money. Sure, the international cricket stars rubbed shoulders against each other. But the best of IPL was these magic moments when somone like Shadab Jakati or Rajat Bhatia foxed the likes of Glichrist and Hayden or Manish Pandey or Shrivats Goswami hammered Dale Steyn and Shane Warne. For almost two months India did nothing but IPL. Cinama halls didn't see movies releasing, TV didn't see new serials starting and I'm sure local businesses found their clientele more glued to television that visiting restaurants or grocery stores. It was almost as if all the money involved in anything associated with "having-a-good-time" was routed to the IPL. Nothing could match the excitement of a three hour T20 match between two privately owned teams. Seriously, the IPL was something India couldn't have enough of.

And now suddenly the IPL has kinda surprised itself. It has proved that there was something that was more interesting (sensational?) that the IPL matches. It was "IPLGate" :). So even though I keep an eye on the cricket matches, I find myself more interested in what Lalit Modi and co. are upto. How many teams did he actually own? How much was his stake? How much money did he swindle? And much more... It also gives me some pleasure in saying "See... I told you... How does someone like SRK, or even worse Priety Zinta and Shilpa Shetty, have these huge sums of money? None of them (nor their respective past and present better halves are as rich as Ambani or Mallya." I may be proved completely wrong and someone could come up with numbers that add up. But you can't deny that I had my moment :D.

The last few days have been especially exciting. What started off as a tiff between a super suave junior minister (popularly found near the terms "External Affairs" (:D), "cattle class", "tweet", etc.) and Lalit, turned into a big brawl and now seems like a full fledged war (where the junior minister has made way for IT officials). The interesting part is that this war is not about who wins. It is about who won't lose.
. If Lalit Modi loses, he will lose his position as the IPL commisioner, pot loads of money and whatever else he must have been cooking behind the scenes.
. If Lalit Modi does not lose, the BCCI might lose its credibility as it failed to act against Modi, the IPL might lose since everyone will continue to look at it as a black money powered, tax evading tournament which didn't clean itself up when the opportunity presented itself.
. If Lalit Modi and the BCCI agree on some common terms and decide to settle the dispute, most likely they'll be able to keep everything under wraps. Given that they have tons of money, politicians from the ruling and the opposition parties, influential businessmen and some people from the media on their side, that wouldn't be too big a problem. In such a case, India loses :(.
Well, India loses in all the three cases above :(.

The best part about an intriguing thriller is the climax. When we almost always find out that someone is schizophrenic :D. But at least there is something we are looking forward to.

So what is it that we are all looking forward to in IPLGate? Would we rejoice if Lalit Modi was found guilty of malpractices and sent to jail? Would we sulk if the IPL was terminated indefinitely? Even if it continues, would IPL be the same again?

The best outcome, I think, might be that Lalit Modi makes way for someone just like him but honest and transperant to be the new head of the IPL. But unfortunately, such a person may not exist and the IPL may never be the same again.

City Of Gold - Lalbaug Paral

Mahesh Manjrekar is all set to release a film on the trials and tribulations of the textile mill workers in Mumbai. Titled "City of Gold" for the Hindi version and "Lalbaug-Paral" for the Marathi version, it seems like the first of its kind movie.

While I've heard many a stories about the textile mills of Mumbai, I haven't had a chance to watch any film on that topic. Apparantly there were as many as 50 textile mils which gave employment to about 250000 people. There were problems of salaries and bonuses which resulted in the textile mill workers going on a strike for almost a year. It eventually led to the closure of the mills. The land that was occupied by these mills was sold to wealthy real-estate owners. The mills have been brought down and large malls, multiplexes, etc. have been built.

There is no single answer about what happened to the 250000 workers who worked in these mills. Looks like "City of Gold" is all about these people.