Sachin Tendulkar!! A myth, a legend...

As I am starting to write this ode for Sachin Tendulkar on the occasion of completing 20 years in international cricket, I am at loss of words. I am pondering as to what do I write which is not been said and written for the great icon, I have also suddenly become conscious to the fact that there is no adjective which has not been used to describe the “God of Cricket”.

So what do I write? I am not going to reflect back on his marathon career and describe how beautifully he has handled the pressure of expectations of a nation on his shoulders, this has been described many times and in a better way than I can do. I am also not going to delve into the unbelievable ocean of records he has created and churn out some numbers just to prove that he is the greatest player of all time because “sometimes legends make reality, and become more useful than the facts” (Salman Rushdie). Also neither I am going to quote the players and experts across eras who have tried to spell out the most exceptional lines to describe his brilliance & humbleness nor I will try and counter his critics by my own judgement and logic (why am I even mentioning them)...

After eliminating so many possibilities the question that still remains is what shall I write? In the past there have been great legends in different fields and there will be many in the future. Some have guided us through turbulent times and shown us the way through and some have made the society immensely proud and happy through their deeds. So to say, all the legends have been templates of human behaviour and worth their place in the history of mankind but I am going to write about a myth, a one in time phenomenon named Sachin Tendulkar that has survived...

I call him a myth because his achievements have reached mythical proportions, because the adulation he is subjected to can only be read in fables and so much so that his journey so far has already become a part of sporting folk-lore all over the country.

I refer to him as a “one in time phenomenon” because there has been and will be no other cricketer for whom I will feel the same level of anxiety which I’ve felt when the master is about to come to bat. There will never ever be the same kind of adrenaline rush which I have experienced by looking at his back-foot drives, the square cuts, the pulls and hooks, the straight punches, the leg side glance, the lofted inside out drives, the straight sixes, the paddle sweep (oh!! I can go on and on...). Watching in no other cricketer’s eyes will ever make me feel that I am an Indian. No one else can make me say the line “Sachin hai na!!”

When he took the centre stage for India, it was the early 90’s, the country was in economic disarray, there were cultural tensions all over the country, there was a rise in terrorism, the population although was young but very much under confident and India was still searching for its next icon. During this phase he took up the mantle of becoming the person to look up to. He became the icon India was looking for, brought the aura of confidence in the Indian youth and moved a whole generation to believe in themselves.

But the biggest reasons why I think there can never be another Sachin Tendulkar is because all the runs he has made for India, all the games he has won for India and all the record books he has shaped while doing so, which are cherished by the millions of Indians (including me) as none less than their own achievements, every mother in this country (including mine) wishes her child be like Sachin and the mountain like devotion he has towards the country and the game, I just can’t stop myself from remembering the 1999 world cup when he had lost his father and was still representing the country with the resolve of a soldier protecting his nation (there are many more...).

I am not here to start a public campaign to nominate Sachin Tendulkar as the next President of India, NO WAY!! Because he is just born to do one thing i.e. play cricket and bring joy and happiness to millions and millions of his fans. I pray God that he keeps on inspiring us through his actions for many more years to come and would just like to end this small token of admiration with these apt words to describe Sachin Tendulkar.

Life has no smooth road for any of us; and in the bracing atmosphere of a high aim the very roughness stimulates the climber to steadier steps, till the legend, "over steep ways to the stars," fulfils itself.

-William Doane

Hindi v/s Marathi??

Monday 9^th November signifies a great historical event i.e. the fall of the Berlin Wall. This was the day when two countries East and West Germany became unified and marked their place in world history. Contrastingly on the same historical day the actions of the MNS MLA’s in the legislative assembly did the job of creating new rifts in the minds of the Hindi and the Marathi speaking population.

It was deeply disheartening to see the elected representatives behave the way they were on a non issue and even more disturbing to see some so called learned people (read Shobhaa De) supporting these actions on National Television.

I call it a non issue because there is no sound logic behind any controversy the MNS creates. Let us know some of the major controversies created by them one by one.

The MNS supporters or the so called leaders of MNS believe that speaking in some other language will hurt the sentiments of Marathi people (Marathi Manoos) and even worse will be disrespectful to Maharashtra and the Maharashtrian culture.

According to me any language in any country is just a mode of communication and if it was really about the cultural aspect than even after so many centuries we would have been still speaking Sanskrit and not disintegrated into more than 20 languages and 100 dialects. So we presume that for ease of communication we invented different languages that were understood by some set of people. Now I would like to remind the MNS supporters that their tallest Marathi icons which they and the whole India takes pride in namely Sachin Tendulkar, Lata Mangeshkar, Asha Bhonsle, Madhuri Dixit, etc have not achieved fame playing for Mumbai or Maharashtra, singing Marathi songs or acting in Marathi movies but doing so for India or singing & acting in Hindi movies. So I don’t think they are being disrespectful to Maharashtra or Marathi by doing so and hence same for others.

Also our great constitution (whose architect himself was a great Marathi Manoos) has given us certain rights and provisions which we are at full liberty to use. Besides this we have to acknowledge the fact that we live in a modern society with developments in business taking place across geography. Just imagine an IT engineer from rural Maharashtra is transferred to the southern states and he is not able to learn to speak the local language. In this case he will be resorting to the other options of speaking Hindi or English and won’t leave the job. This in no case is disrespecting the local language.

The second issue they rake in time and again is that the “parprantiyas” (outsiders) have stolen all the Marathi Manoos jobs. Also quite annoyingly the definition of “Parprantiya” is constrained to people from UP and Bihar.

I would like to ask that are there no Marathi people working outside Maharashtra? There are lakhs of Marathi people working outside Maharashtra and nobody is stopping the rest to follow suit. If the MNS believes in the principle of local jobs to local people than it is kind of justifying the acts committed against Indians in Canada and Australia (no surprises that Mr. Raj Thackrey has never opened his mouth against atrocities against Indians in foreign countries).

I understand the fact that Mumbai is saturating and there is a lot of load on the infrastructure because of population influx. But the influx is not only from UP and Bihar, it is also contributed to a large extent by other states and rural Maharashtra but as only the UP and Bihar people are not the part of MNS vote bank they are targeted. What Mr. Raj should concentrate on is to target his corrupt Marathi officials who take bribes and legalise the slum houses of parprantiyas and provide them ration Cards.

In perspective it is no war between Hindi and Marathi, it is just Raj Thackrey trying to create a situation and doing what his uncle did 40 years ago against South Indians in order to enhance his political career. He is misguiding people to capture the vote base of Shiv Sena and teach his estranged cousin Uddhav a lesson (“Usne humko bahut mara aur humne usko ek hi mara par solid mara”). The Congress on other hand is playing opportunist and using Raj Thackrey as a stooge to curb Shiv Sena. If Raj had real and logical issues he would be any time ready to debate them on public platforms and not make use of Hooligans on any and every issue he creates.

I still believe that we are a cultured and free society and we are meant to co-exist. Our society as a whole has withstood the test of times. Our political parties have resorted to caste, religion and many other divisive policies but we are still one and will be one nation. This is what Shiv Sena learnt in 40 years and this is what Raj Thackrey shall learn in due course because I still feel that the average Marathi Manoos has not lost his “Manuski”..

My First ever blog!!!

Finally!!!! I am so excited. After days, months and years of pondering, I have decided to start my blog (I thought it would be better to start before 2012 strikes).. Oh sorry, I just forgot to introduce myself. My Name is Shashikant and I am in no way related to the southern superstar Rajnikant ;-)

I have completed my bachelor’s degree in Mechanical Engineering and when even that could not satisfy my urge to learn (read “get me a job”) I decided to do my MBA (and sadly even that could not get me a job)..

So now ‘Why do you want to blog?’ is a question my friends ask me.. There are numerous reasons:

1. It is for free.
2. It’s my constitutional right (Right too Speech).
3. I have no job right now (Recession and its effects).
4. It’s a happening world (From Politics, to business, to sports, to entertainment, etc).
5. There are people who will read (hopefully) what I shall write.
6. And I like it.

My areas of interest are mostly Business, Politics, Sports and Entertainment and I would be trying to cover each of them..

So here I start my journey and hope many would join me during course..

Happy Reading!!!