The Ace of 64-squares - Grandmaster Viswanathan Anand
If there is one game that people all over the world knows that India plays, it should be ‘Cricket’. Though being a British game, cricket and India are synonymous - many, over here, eat and sleep cricket. In my office, I can see most of my colleagues glued to their laptops and desktops, constantly refreshing (in spite of having ‘auto-refresh’ feature) the Rediff cricket live score page. You go to a tea shop, there you see an old FM radio connected to obscenely big speakers playing cricket commentary. Even if the tea shop owner doesn’t like cricket, he is urged to tune into cricket news - customers’ popular demand. You board a bus/train, you see people hooked to their earphones, which again is hooked to the FM-integrated GSM/CDMA mobile phones. Nowadays, no one seem to be buying mobile phones sans FM, if not Bluetooth. When kids are being brought up, cricket naturally enters their lives as a popular form of physical activity - don’t ask me how, even the umpire is said to be ‘physically active’ in cricket-dom. Such is the craze for cricket in India!! What about other sports? Well, they just exist.. and this is one of the most important reasons why India doesn’t fare well in Olympics of any kind.
My favorite game is football (European), and chess, and occasionally used to play badminton. In today’s world, all games are judged by their monetization value. In India, cricket has the highest monetization potential, and FYI - Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) is the world’s richest cricket body!!
When I opened today’s newspaper, the headlines screamed “Anand is World Champion“.
Viswanathan Anand is the world chess champion again. The Indian maestro won the 12-game world chess championship match against Vladimir Kramnik of Russia 6.5-4.5.. - The Hindu
I was curious to see the people’s reactions on the online editions of the news paper. Sadly, only a handful of congratulations - stark contrast to staggering number of comments a similar article on cricket would have gained.
Well, it is of no use blaming the people for such a subdued reaction to this great achievement. I would blame the government, both central and the state. Sports like football, badminton, tennis, chess, basket ball and volley ball must also be given equal importance. Also, a person’s sports activities must be considered when he applies for university education - leads to the creation of a well-balanced individual, and ultimately the society, if the numbers add up!
I consider Anand’s success as another key factor in raising India’s image among the global community, equivalent to what the ISRO scientists did with Chandrayaan-1. What do you think?
You can find more about Viswanathan Anand here.
Front page pic source - Wikimedia
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October 30, 2008 at 1:20 pm
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