Face To Face With Cricket

Face To Face With Cricket

Cricket as you all know is respected as a religion in India. A child when started standing on his feet first hold a bat in his hands in this country. Since this sports is religion cricketers i.e the player which plays this sports automatically becomes God. Cricket World Cup which held in four years is like a sacred ritual for followers of this faith in Indian subcontinent, you can see cricket everywhere in clubs,restaurants,buses,homes and even some cinema halls playing important cricket matches in their theater instead of movies during this period. But what this sports think about its status in this part of the world. On my special request and some approach it was ready to give me some time for this conversation, here is excerpt from the same.

Me : First of all thanks for taking out some time for me from this busy schedule.

Cricket : It's all right, you deliver your questions fast please.

Me : How do you feel about your status in this part of the world i.e Indian subcontinent ? 

Cricket : Who don't like attention. People are crazy about me and I enjoyed it.

Me : Don't you think you are overrated in this part of the world?

Cricket : It depends on how you see me. If you treat me as a sport I am overrated but if you treat me as a religion I think I have still a long way to go. My followers most of the time maintain decorum in the stadium.

Me : Most of the time! That means not always.

Cricket : It sometimes happens in passion, hitting bottles to opponent, destroying sitting arrangements, burning posters I think it is good at times for humanity.

Me : But you are not known in many countries of the world. 

Cricket : (Laughs) Kabhi kisi ko mukammal jahan nahin milta . Do you know baseball, rugby, ice hockey, basketball? Everybody has its own territory , has own area of rule.

Me : Look at football it is famous all over the world.

Cricket : That cheap sports! Just take a ball and make twenty two people run in knickers behind it. What is it's status in front of me. Countries like Trinidad and Tobago, Ghana, Sudan, etc plays this game have you heard about existence of such countries. Don't compare me with football I am gentle men's game whereas football is the game of hooligans. 

Me : So much money was wasted on you in Indian subcontinent that other sports felt neglected.

Cricket : I also feel sad for them but people worships rising sun. You win with me that's why you all like me when in past you were good with hockey you treated it as national sports. It all depends on timing and I think now I am done with your questions, I have to go now.

Me : One last question Sir. What you think about words like war,battle, ground zero, attack, enemies used for you or in reference to you? 

Cricket : ( Sad ) I am just a sport, a tool which brings nation,people together with the spirit of game and sportsmanship. I don't like these words, war and battles spread hatred, I am for love. I request all who are reading me that I am just a game and not the matter of life and death. Win and defeats are my part and with every defeat a team tries to be better next time.

He left after that but his last words echoed for hours in my mind. Why sports which teaches us team work,leadership skills, respect for the opponent, humility,etc becomes a mark of animosity? We must think about it.  

Face To Face With Creativity

Face To Face With Creativity

There is a saying in Hindi 'Jahan Na Pahunche Ravi, Wahan Pahunche Kavi' which means that a poet could reach at places where even sun couldn't. It means that our imagination and creativity take us to places otherwise unreachable. It points out things in us, in our surroundings which we either ignores or don't see at all due to a veil of some traditions,religion and culture. Creativity highlights the beauty or the ugliness of certain things hiding behind the mask of ignorance owing to certain societal pressures. 

Many incidents recently like attack on french magazine Charlie Hebdo which killed journalists and cartoonists for depicting Prophet Mohammad's cartoon, violent demonstration against movies like PK  and Ram Rahim 's (MSG ), ban on books by Salman Rushdie, Perumal Murugan, Tasleema Nasreen, Dan Brown,etc for defaming religions and many such acts by so called moral police have tried to curb creativity and openly condemned it. This made me contact her to chat with me for her views on all these controversy related to her. Here is an excerpt of this conversation :

Me : I can see that your wounds are still fresh and present all over you. Which one hurts you the most?
Creativity (CRTY): (laughs) : It is like asking a mother which child she like the most. All wounds are direct attack on me and hurts a lot. But you see that they have never healed from the beginning of the time so I am habitual to them. Now absence of these wounds hurts the most than their presence.

Me : Is it right to attack you for the reasons they( attackers) give?
Crty : Do you watch reality shows?
Me: Yes.
Crty : Do you find reasons given by contestant to nominate each other right?
Me: No.
Crty : Yes you are right. But they still nominate using these silly reasons just to save themselves. Similarly these religious fanatics and moral contractor attack me to run their shops without understanding what I am trying to depict which if they understand make their whole existence worthless.

Me: But don't you think hurting some one's religious sentiments is not right and doing that again and again is like making mockery of them?
Crty : “Call people to the way of your Lord with wisdom and good teaching, and argue with them in the most courteous way” [16:125] , this is what Allah says in Quran they can argue and change the views of my preparators. Dedicate your being to god. He is the one to be ultimately relied upon. Those who know of his support are forever free from fear,worry and sorrow, these are Lord Krishna's words from Bhagvat Gita. If they were close to god than why they fear. In reality I am close to Him. I have no sorrows,fear and worry.

Me: Hmm! You possesses good knowledge of each religion then why you lampoon them?
Crty: That's what the reason I lampoon them because I know them. There is no religion which is perfect only god is perfect. These religious fanatics believes that they have become perfect which in a way is insult to god and a greater sin in every religion. So they are defaming god not I. Moreover if you are closed to criticism you are stale and dead.

Me : You talking like you are in frequent contact of God.
Crty: Yes I am. I am in His touch. My preparator are in His touch. He gives us the permission, he allows us do do what we are doing. If it was not His will we wouldn't have power to do such big projects.

Me : Any messages for anybody.
Crty: Live and let live. Life is tough and full of problems. Don't consider me as any problem. I will always prove useful to humanity and society. So don't try to kill,hurt,curb me because I will never die,nor kill only changes forms and yes I would also like to thank you who nowadays want to talk to me. 

I think she had made it clear that she and not the so called saver of religions and cultures are close to god and His creations. But still I think it is not right to hurt some one's sentiments but then truth always hurts. So lets creativity flow in it's own course.

First part of Face to Face series : Face To Face With A Habitual Convert. 

Face to Face with A Habitual Convert

Face to Face with A Habitual Convert

Change is the only constant. Since the birth of human race we are in the process of change from animal like to humans, from ignorant to enlightened and from god fearing to god fearing. No, you haven't read it wrong we were and we are god fearing people having no understanding about him. We fear to question his existence. We fear to question his ways and in this fear we bow to him. Many perhaps don't consider me correct but believe it or not this is true for most of us. But this man is different whom I met during this period of nationwide discussions and parliament uproar on Ghar Wapsi and Conversions. Here is excerpt of my conversation with him :

Me : What you do?

Habitual Convert (HC) : I beg to feed my family of six. I, my wife and four children.

Me: Where do you beg?

HC: It depends on the day of the week ,Tuesday - Hanuman Temple, Wednesday -  Shiv Temple, Thursday -  Gurudwara, Friday - Mosque, Saturday - Sai Baba Temple, Sunday - Church. Monday is my holiday. I spend time with my children and my wife goes to Durga Mata's temple.

Me: It's obvious that you beg in name of different gods at different places. What else you do with your appearance?

HC: Tilak for temples, skull caps for mosques, and nothing for churches and gurudwaras only god's name is enough.

Me: You change your religion,faith daily. Don't you fear God?

HC: No, I love god without differentiating in his types. Sahab! See, my gods changes daily but not my condition. I am either a Muslim beggar, a Hindu beggar and so on. When god don't fear from my deplorable condition why should I fear from one whom condition is unknown to me. But yes I fear from police they sometime hits very hard to move us away from some places.

Me: Have you ever officially converted your religion?

HC: Yes! You don't know about life nothing is easy to achieve. For ration card I converted to Hinduism, for minority card I became a Muslim, for a year's supply of food I prefer Christianity. One religion for easy Aadhar card, another religion for BPL card and another for food security and another for children's education. It takes only 1 to 2 hour in changing your god.

Me: What was your religion of birth?

HC: I don't know my father, my grand father,uncles every body used to change religion for their benefits. Either we follow all religion or none. 

Me: Is there any change in your status when you change religion?

HC: See in cities you don't see much change, poor remains poor here in every circumstances but I can tell you about my one uncle who was not allowed to enter in a temple because of his low caste. He converted to another religion and then for sake of his Ghar Wapasi they reconverted him in the same temple he was not allowed to enter before. He was also allotted with a home in the village. What a lucky man he was? Sometimes I wish I would be at his place.

Me: Do you know about Anti-Conversion Bill?

HC: No!

Me: It will stop such conversions of benefits, if it becomes a law.

HC: Please sahib! Stop it any how. It's matter of my family's livelihood. Hey Bhagwan! garibo ki thodi si khushi bhi tujhse bardasht nahin hoti? (O! God! Can't you see poor happy.)

I heard somewhere that hunger knows only one religion that is food and I don't even know whether changing one's religion is good or bad but I do know what hunger means. We often see and read people committing crimes as harsh as murders to satisfy their hunger in that sense conversion appears a petty crime. But we look religion as a matter of identity then no crime is as harsh as taking away once identity. I let your free thinking decide on this crucial issue. Perhaps I write more on it in my coming posts.