On Independence and parts thereof

Over the long Independence Day weekend, there were a number of interesting pieces that one came across. There are these two pieces by Vikram Doctor which give completely different takes.

The first one is an effort to remember the various speakers on that significant night of the 14th / early morning of the 15th August 1947. There is one paragraph which is pretty interesting:

What is nearly forgotten is that between Nehru and Dr.Radhakrishnan was another speaker, symbolically chosen to second Nehru, who was soon to become a victim of those divisions. His name was Chaudhuri Khaliquzzaman of the Muslim League, presumably chosen to represent the Muslim voice in the Constituent Assembly. That this role didn’t go to a Muslim from the Congress like Maulana Azad may have been because an attempt was being at that time to involve a wider spectrum of Indian political opinion in the nascent government. The Cabinet sworn in the next day included non-Congress ministers in prominent positions like Dr.B.Ambedkar as Law Minister, the Justice Party’s Shanmukham Chetty as Finance Minister and the Hindu Mahasabha’s Dr.Shyama Prasad Mookerjee as Industries Minister.

His other piece is a quest for children born on that specific midnight, like Saleem Sinai. Unfortunately he does not find any news about births occurring on that particular day and time, even after checking the archives of the Times of India.  Not finding any mention of any real life midnight child, he explores the city of Bombay through the words of Rushdie.

If 1981, the year it won the Booker Prize, saw the birth of a formidable literary talent, it also saw the birth of Bombay as a literary city – colourful and chaotic, teeming and stinking, yet also wealthy and stylish, dangerous yet not discouragingly so, a city poised between West and East (but usefully English speaking) and in Bollywood, possessed of an industry involved in creating even more tales to add to those already spun by the city.

To round up this post, I close with Salil Tripathi’s piece in Mint where he traces 20 years of the reforms launched by PV Narasimha Rao and his finance minister Dr MM Singh. His closing sentence, as is always the case, gives you this hopeful thread to ponder upon for the future:

As India tries to reclaim its erstwhile predominant position in the global economy, it has the opportunity to show that economic and political freedoms can go hand-in-hand; that to grow you don’t have to be authoritarian, and democracy doesn’t hinder wealth. That might sound false to those still in awe of China. But India is not China, and that’s worth celebrating.

To quote the pilot in my flight back to Mumbai from Kolkata on the 15th, Jai Hind.

Sreesanth on Indian fast bowling

Read here:

“Focus is surely important, but again everyone lives their own personal life as well. As long as he knows the thin line between foolishness and bravery, that is very important,”

Dilip Tirkey: Best wishes

India’s best hockey player of late has just retired.

“I could not fulfil my dream of clinching the World Cup title and Olympic medals. I did not get the chance to play in the World Cup and would not be able to play in the Commonwealth Games at home. This grudge will remain throughout my life,” he said

He was one of the best defenders in the world in recent memory. More importantly, a big role model for his tribe in Orissa.

World Cup T20 – Day 3

India outclass South Africa

Australia outclass Pakistan

Suresh Raina of course has made himself a permanent selection for the Indian team in T20 and ODI. Barring any dramatic injuries or loss of form, I would be penciling his name for the next World Cup along with MSD. His innings of 101 had three main dimensions which clearly demonstrate his class

• Quick observation of the South African bowling tactics and appropriate adjustment including his stance in the crease – predictable seam bowlers bowling just short of length, looking for bounce all of them of similar pace.
• Setting the pace of the innings and gradually increasing his strike rate thus avoiding any pressure of the run rate on himself and his partners at the other end
• Willingness to stay at the crease doing both the role of the anchor and the scorer

The Australia Pakistan game as well as the Pakistan Bangladesh game on Saturday had a key commonality. The top order scored heavily upto the 14th-15th over. Then a few wickets fell and the scoring simply stopped. Australia for example were 161 in 16 overs. They ended up with 191 scoring just 30 in the remaining 4 overs and losing about 6 wickets. Pakistan on Saturday had a similar story.

India on the other hand did the reverse. Their run rate in the first ten overs was hovering around the 6 rpo and the second half Raina, Yuvraj and Dhoni went for the runs, 75 runs in the last 6 overs.

South Africa tried a similar tactic with Kallis, Smith and DeVilliers giving it a whack in the last 5 overs. But their fire power was not good enough. At the end of the 16th over, India were 126/3 while RSA were 126/2. In the next 4 overs India scored 60 losing 2 wickets, RSA scored 46 losing 3 wickets. Clearly India’s firepower is slightly better than RSA.

One may ask whether relying on the end over firepower is a sustainable tactic. Maybe not but remember that India were without Gambhir and Vijay, a much improved batsman in this format, got out for a golden duck. Under normal circumstances, the first three of the Indian batting order have the capability to take the scoring in the first half of the innings to above 7-8 rpo.

However, South Africa would really need to open up their thinking processes. Their bowling plan, well prepared in the dressing room, was followed to the T mechanically and one must say precisely. However, the Indians kind of figured out the line and length of the bowling and were benefiting from their moving up the learning curve. Their batting was another prepared plan – with a mental target of 160-165. They thought they can follow the plan and kick up the gear in the closing overs. The extra 20 runs was considered unimportant.

Moving to today’s matches, first match for Zimbabwe and the pressure is on their opponets Sri Lanka who need to win. SLA lost out to New Zealand and thus have the stress. Zim on the other hand had a couple of wins in the warm-ups – against Australia and Pakistan no less. They even had an official T20 (or maybe an ODI, I forget) win over the West Indies very recently.  So it’s back on Mahela and Kumar Sangakkara.

England also make their first appearance with KP’s mind more occupied with the birth of his child than on the tournament. West Indies of course had a good win over Ireland but their batting was disappointing.

We are yet to see any major upsets in this tournament so far. Today is as good a day.

World Cup T20 – Day 2

India picked up a +2 NRR. Pakistan win by 21 runs.

I actually missed watching the games, except for a few snatches, as I was with some friends drowning the bad performance blues at the Landmark Quiz.

I did catch the end of the Indian chase with Vijay missing his half century and Dhoni hitting a couple of sixes to finish it off. The Afghan team were outclassed no doubt but there is no shame in this defeat. I thought they were extremely graceful and gave their all in the game. Hamid Hussain’s attempt at a skier is indicative of the passion and hard aggression that they have.

More importantly, in cricketing terms, the Indian team left out Rohit Sharma and went with Yusuf Pathan and Ravindra Jadeja. I had predicted this in a chat show earlier in the week. This is India’s best XI. It gives Dhoni five highly capable spinners and three seam-swing bowlers. It also gives the batting depth right down to no 9. However, Rohit Sharma may be advised to keep a watch out for Raina.

Did not watch the game against Pakistan and so cannot make any comments. However, looking at the scoresheet it would seem that batting is not so much of a problem here in St Lucia as it was at Providence. Of course, the quality of bowling needs to be considered as well.

Finally, a small trivia piece about the Razzaqs. This is Abdur and this is Abdul.

World Cup T20 – Day 1

New Zealand beat Sri Lanka by 1 ball and 2 wickets

West Indies beat Ireland by 70 runs

Three things came up as significant today

1. Ground Conditions: Slow pitches, slightly sluggish outfield, large dimensions (at least at Providence) queers the pitch towards the slower bowlers and the spinners. In fact the worst bowlers in the SLA v NZL match were the two fast bowlers Bond and Malinga. So we are likely to have

• Low scoring games i.e. 130 – 150 range
• More and more teams starting their bowling with a spinner
• Dibbly Dobbly bowlers will have their places in the team assured

It’s not as if sixes and fours are not possible. Darren Sammy and Jesse Ryder showed it is possible. Obviously, the hitting has to be done with a touch more effort than normal. Bad balls of course help as it did Sammy.

2. Classic batting: Mahela Jayawardene showed the value of class. Though he ended up in the losing side, his innings was evidence that T20 is not just slam bang stuff. Considering his partner Dilshan (3 of 19) was completely off the grid, the run rate of 6+ in the first 6 overs tells you how much Mahela contributed, without a single slog.

It also tells me that Gautam Gambhir is likely to be a key batsman for India. Technically and temperamentally, he is the best in the current Indian line-up and ideal for this kind of hybrid of aggression and attrition. The other players will have to bat around him with their 2 over blasts. After Gambhir, Dhoni has the right ability for this kind of innings but he would be coming too late in the order to be effective.

3. Fielding standards: From the crap in IPL, there’s a sea change in fielding standards, especially catching. Darren Sammy seemed to have Spiderman’s web shooters stretching out and catching everything. So that’s a big change

Watching on television, one discovered a lost art of commentary – silence. Commentators actually shut up for minutes letting the TV audience watch the game intently. And the topics of discussion were shots, strategies, form, players – not blimps, forefronts of technology, carbon kamals, certain individuals, sweat equity, etc.

Today big day for Afghanistan. Like Eliza Doolittle making her first presence in high society, the boys from Kabul enter the world stage playing their spiritual neighbours India. They promise a surprise.

In fact it is a complete sub-continent / South Asia day in West Indies. Pakistan play Bangladesh in the next match.

South India on an Autorickshaw

2,800 kms in 20 days all over South India? If you have a nice air-conditioned car, it would be cool. How about the humble autorickshaw?

Ouch! Those of you who bump along in autorickshaws on pot-holed roads of Indian towns will be wincing no doubt. But it is a matter of skill and stamina to drive something like this.

April 2nd, we have the Malabar Rampage.

The Malabar Challenge will require contestants to travel an approximate 150km daily, performing a variety of tasks on the way.

So who’s bright idea is this? Chap called Aravind Bremanandam. Apparently, he hit on this idea of automotive adventures as a means of creating greater level of engagement with the country.

“What is a very ‘India’ vehicle, I asked myself,” he says. “Ambassador cars, or maybe the Tata Indica — an Indian-made car. But really, coming to India and travelling in a car isn’t out of the ordinary.”

That was when Bremanandam zeroed in on the humble, home-grown autorickshaw — foreign tourists were even known to go gaga over its kitschy charms. And thus was born the now world famous Rickshaw Challenge.

The route map looks quite daunting but one of the participants and a popular blogger, Adrianna Tan says:

“I love India. I love autorickshaws. Put two and two together — a natural way of seeing India all over again. I’ve been to India many times. But to do it in an auto, while driving it… is completely different. I wanted to do it for the adventure of being on a road-trip in India’s most iconic vehicle.”

You can follow Adrianna’s progress at the rickrollshaw.com where using a variety of gadgets and telecommunication modes, including I suppose jungle smoke signals, will be giving blow by blow updates.

Palwankar Baloo

Ramachandra Guha’s A Corner of A Foreign Field started of as a biography of Palwankar Baloo (and his brothers). Guha calls him the first great Indian cricketer. The story of the Palwankar brothers and Baloo in particular reads like an epic – the stigma of an untouchable caste, the reluctance of the Brahmin Hindu teams to select him, the separation in the tents, the denial of captaincy (when he very clearly deserved it) and the redemption on the field.

His bowling stats seem to speak for themselves: 179 wickets in 33 matches, that’s almost 6 wickets per match -. 17 times 5 wickets in an innings.

In a tour of England in 1911, Baloo in 14 matches against first side county teams took a total of 114 wickets. Since then only Vinoo Mankad has taken more than 100 wickets in an English summer.

Guha is definitely a fine writer mirroring the cricket on the field with the socio-cultural metamorphosis outside the field. He compares the case of Baloo with that of D’Oliveira, that of West Indies who had white captains till Sir Frank Worrell came along and in particular  South Africa-Indian golfer Sewsunkar Sewgolan who after winning the Natal Open in the 60′s had to wait outside the clubhouse in the rain for the orderly to bring his medal and prizes.

Unfortunately, there is not much else available about the Palwankars though Guha does list out a number of notes and citations from various newspapers of those times including Tilak’s Mahratta. In particular, there is Vithal (Baloo’s younger brother and the first Dalit to captain the Hindus) who has written his autobiography Maze Krida-Jivan (My Sporting Life). But it is out of print. Only about 1000 copies were printed when it was published in 1948. One of those copies is with Guha. I wonder if he can share it.

Today’s Web Discovery : 17th November 2009

Today was a lazy day overall. That gave me much time to browse and discover new knowledge.

India the Jugaad Country: This blog post written by Mohanjit Jolly gives a delightful insight into the resilience of Indians. In A Wednesday, Naseeruddin Shah comments, “we are resilient by force, not by choice”. But that is the paradox, jugaad happens only when there are constraints.

The concept called Jugaad. For many Indians, especially from the north, this is a commonly-used term. Jugaad is the summation of what makes India tick – enterprising, resourceful, and making things work to address what needs to be done within the constrained resources.

[...]

In a developing country, one simply “does” because “not doing it or waiting” is simply not an option. That’s probably why the “ho jaiga (it will be done)” attitude is so prevalent in India, because one knows that whatever the issue, one will figure out a way to address it, although the exact mechanism and timeline may be very unorthodox and unpredictable.

Jugaad is survival.

Torture Songs: In military parlance, they are called Long Range Acoustic Devices. Like rocket launchers, these LRADs are used to propel anything from heavy metal to girl power pop on the Al-Qaeda. Off the list, this one seemed the most interesting

Barney The Dinosaur’s I Love You : The Guardian newspaper in London called this sugary lump of fear inducing madness the most “overused” song in the U.S. interrogator’s arsenal. Interrogators at Guantanamo Bay, however, used the sappy kids’ show theme song as “futility music” to convince detainees of the futility of maintaining their silence. One United Kingdom human rights group protested President George W. Bush’s visit to England by blasting the song in his general direction. Now that’s a second strike.

Futility music, I dare say. I wonder what Bruce Springsteen and AC/DC must be wondering.

Phrases from the sea: Feeling “Under the weather”? Or are you in “the doldrums”? Try “chewing some fat”. “By and large” you will be okay. The seas connect the world and how can language be immune to its influence. After sailors have contributed to the growth of trade and culture by taking stuff from one part of the world to the other. And so to with language.

Periodic Table for Marketers: (Blinds.com) This is probably the best discovery of the day. What is brilliant is the simplicity of representation and easy assimilation possibilities. It also gives the marketer a range of tools to build his marketing strategy. Thus building confidence.

Uber-cool Shillong: DNA reports an annual rock concert celebrating music icons like Elvis and The Beatles in Shillong. Local bands and artists take the stage in the rock capital of the country.

Nazi Witch Hunt: (NYT ) The Nazi witch hunt continues with octogenarians and nonagenarians on the dock for massacres and murders during the Holocaust.

Paper Art: (myinterestingfiles.com) Peter Callesen, a Dane, makes these beautiful sculptures with A4 plain paper.

Paper art by Peter Callesen, myinterestingfiles.com

Paying for online content: (Readwriteweb.com) With print editions of newspapers folding up, this is just adding to the bad news. Forrester reports that over 80% of internet users in the US and Canada will not pay to access newspaper and magazine websites. Essentially there is no market.

Google Wave demo, Pulp Fiction style: Great to end the day

The Next 4 Billion

Tomi T Ahonen, author of “Communities Dominate Brands” writes in this blog post:

To put it in context, there are 480 million newspapers printed daily; 800 million automobiles registered on the planet; 1.1 billion personal computers including all desktops, laptops, notebooks and netbooks; 1.2 billion fixed landine phones; 1.4 billion internet users; 1.5 billion TV sets; 1.7 billion unique holders of a credit card of any type; and 2.1 billion unique holders of a banking account of any kind. But 4 billion mobile phone subscriptions.

That is at one level astounding but then there is visual confirmation that this is true. Even in India, without checking the numbers, there must be more mobile phone users than TV households, newspaper readers, computer users, internet subscribers, etc.

Tomi says that the first 4 billion were the classic “early adopters”. But the next 4 billion will be different. To quote

So here is the big news. The next 4 Billion will not be like you and me. They will not be wealthy enough to own a PC and have a broadband connection and read blogs or do any Twittering on a PC. Over 95% of the next 4 billion will be in the Developing World, and while there will be of course an emerging middle class who may aspire to own a netbook, those tend to be wealthy enough to already have a subscription today. Those next four billion will be either those who do not have any connection today, at all, or else are second and third subscriptions to those who already have one today. Either way, the behavior of those new subscribers is distinctly different from what the mobile industry has grown accustomed to in the past decades.

Countries in Asia and Africa led by India and China will soon dominate the cellular waves. They will decide the services, the prices, the content, the usage – in short, they will define the market. This is a the new community of consumers, of citizens who have the means to give voice to their lives.

We saw mobile phones in use during all the recent elections in India.

If one looks at some of the advertisements of the mobile phone companies like Airtel and Tata DoCoMo on Indian television, already there is this clear highlighting of their mobile subscriber base.  Airtel has SRK talking about “Akele kuch bhi nahin…” and then the plug about 110 million people. DoCoMo has this “Friendship Express” theme.

One needs to watch this carefully.