India goes down under in a Down Under series

The inability to win elusive Test Series in Australia will now become a blot of shame on the otherwise glorious career of the Golden generation of Indian batsmen. The loss at MCG on 29th Dec came as a shock not because of its individuality but because this is straight 5th overseas defeat of India. No one can forget the 0-4 drubbing received by India at the hands of English Team. This is only the second time in my life where i have seen such a grand whitewash, the first being 3-0 loss in 1999-2000 series in Australia. The Indian batsmen were new and inexperienced in that series but the team that played in England in 2011 was one of the finest produced by India. So it becomes very complex to examine the reasons behind the defeat. Indian batsmen ( except Dravid and occasionally Sachin) were completely overwhelmed by the English bowlers. All these golden boys of Indian cricker will retire in a year or so and their absence will create a big black hole in Indian cricket and our Test prospects will go for a toss.

We are not able to find a suitable replacement of Sourav Ganguly (Sourav retired in Nov 2008) and we have given chances to Pujara, Yuvraj, Raina, Kohli but no one has been able to cement his place. There are big question marks on the techniques of Dhoni and Gambhir on bouncy wickets and Laxman has never been consistent in his career, despite of scoring many big glorious centuries. So it creates a huge pressure on Dravid and Sachin and whenever one of them fails, India fails. The same has happened in England,
Dravid played brilliantly but Sachin's performance was not upto the mark and same is destined to happen in Australia. Actually it has just happened in Melbourne, in the Boxing Day Test. Both these batsmen failed in 2nd Inning and India lost the match miserably. So for the betterment of Indian cricket we should not press for the retirement of these great batsmen rather we should first find no. 6th batsman. No need to go to T-20 to find one, get it from Ranji.

Indian bowling looked pretty decent and Umesh Yadav's performance was very very good. Its a very good sign for India cricket but Ashwin needs to improve his bowling.

Performance Rating of Boxing Day Test
Umesh Yadav                8/10
Zaheer Khan                 7/10
Ishant Sharma               7/10
Sachin Tendulkar           6/10
Ravichandran Ashwin    6/10
Rahul Dravid                 5/10
Virendra Sehwag          5/10
Mahendra Singh Dhoni 1/10
Gautam Gambhir          0/10
Virat Kohli                   0/10
V V S Laxman             0/10

Life is beautiful

For the last few months, i was slogging to get the holy grail of Indian bureaucracy and in between i got a great gift from the God. On 25th October, 12:55 PM, I become father  of a 2.75 kg son. To see a new life made of your own blood and flesh and with the grace of God is an unbelievable feeling. Fatherhood is an amazing stage of life and this makes you a complete man or person. I miss my dear Father in this dear moment. He died an unnatural death on 6th December 2008 midnight (3 years back) but i can still feel his presence and blessing with me each and every fleeting moment. Thank you Pratiksha for giving me such a beautiful gift and thank you my God for blessing me with this gift.

In search of an Indian Identity: Part 1

They say India is a Secular Republic just like US but with a subtle difference. US govt is not supposed to interfere in religious affairs without any exception while Indian secularism allows Indian govt to interfere in religious affair and most of the times this interference becomes a nemesis for the growth of Secularism in India.

Every time when Indian govt had tried to interfere in religious affairs it had attracted its share of criticism. It started with the abolition of inhumane Sati practice, abolition of polygamy, abolition of untouchability (this abolition has to be respected and implemented in every corner of the country, its a shame that untouchability is still prevalent in many parts of our country). But if i look at all these reforms, i can easily observe the absence of any such reform in Muslim society of India. They say polygamy is allowed in Islam but polygamy is also not prohibited in Hinduism then why Hindus are not allowed to keep multiple wives while on the other hand Muslims have that rights. I totally abhor the concept of polygamy but why Indian govt has not made any law so far to ban polygamy in Indian Muslim society. Does that make them less Muslim?

I have digressed a lot from the topic of my post, lets start with India as a country. They say India as a country did not exist before 18th century but so was the case with US, Italy, Germany, Iraq, Malaysia etc. Nation state is a modern concept and we became a nation state and Indians on 26th Jan 1950 but what about the history and people of India before that date. What is the base civilization of India. They say its a synthesis or a fusion of various streams of creeds, religions and people who continuously migrated to this region since the advent of last interglacial period or before that. So who were Indians before Aryans migrated to India (although  the migration concept is now hotly debated and Mrs. Romila Thapar has modified his theory of Aryan Invasion from Aryan migration)? A logical answer is the Dravidians or the indigenous people of India or the inhabitants of Indus Valley Civilization. I respect that culture and all places from Harrapa, Mohen-jo-daro to Kalibangan, Lothal etc are very close to my heart and not even in my remotest dreams i will plan to destroy the remnants of that culture. Every Indian should feel attached and proud of that glorious civilization.  This is the fundamental premise of Indian identity as well as the bedrock of Indian civilization.

The Cup of Joy finally returns..

The Picture says it all. Its been a long wait but an eventful one (Image courtesy Cricinfo.com) 

Some things never change

Its a dream for any aspiring cricketer to play for Team India and Its a dream for every Team India player to play in  World Cup and no dream is bigger than defeating arch rivals Australia and Pakistan in knock out stages of  the World Cup. This Indian team has done it all. When a nation grows then its friends and rivals both change. And  because of this reason only that India-Australia match heat is comparable to India-Pakistan match heat. For an young aspiring Indian, victory over Australia is more significant than victory over Pakistan but loss to Pakistan is comparable to a crime that can not be washed even if you take 100 dips in holy Ganges. Its party emotional and partly because of a the confidence of growing middle class of India. India loves to compete and defeat Australia on the one hand while it loves to always defeat Pakistan on other hand. The last 10 years has made this huge change in the mindset of Indians and this reflects in the Buddha like posture of Dhoni. The bunch of jokers have become world beaters and as they say Rome was not built in a day, the same is true for team India. Sachin has remained a great agent of this transformation and all the players starting from Ganguly, Dravid, Prasad, Kumble, Srinath, Laxman etc  have played their parts. Dhoni and others are just culmination of the process started by Sachin decades back. Its a fitting tribute to Sachin and we all owe it to Sachin.

There are two things that can unite this nation. War is one and Sachin is second. It has been sheer pleasure to experience Indian wins against Pakistan in 1992, 1996, 1999, 2003 and yesterday. 1992 World Cup was a gone case for India still we defeated Pakistan despite escapades from Miandad. 1996 win was a sweet one as it propelled us to Semi Final against Sri Lanka and we failed miserably in that Semi. 1999 World Cup match against Pakistan was similar to 1992. 2003 World Cup match was the grandest match ever played by India against Pakistan till then. It was the match that added another story in the Legend of Sachin. Akhtar was silenced forever. Anwar and Akaram were retired forever. Yesterday match was very much

one sided and Pakistan managed to fight only till 35 overs of Pakistan inning. I was expecting that the match would go till 49th or final over but 260 was too much for Pakistanis. Pakistan team also deserves some claps as no body gave them any chance before this world Cup yet they managed to destroy Australia, Sri Lanka and West Indies. Afridi looks like a man on mission but you can not win a cricket epic if your team does not perform. Yunis Khan, Razzak looked miserable yesterday and Mohammad Hafiz shot was suicidal.

Sri Lanka is more formidable foe than Pakistan and they have enviable top and middle order batsmen, and bowlers. Greatest bowler Muralidharan will play his last match so this final is destined to become a clash of legends, Sachin on one hand and Murali on  other. May the best team wins. Amen.

P.S. Somethings never change. Sun rises in east, India defeats Pakistan in world Cup, capital of Singapore is Singapore etc etc..