Page 87 - DENG101_Communication Skills-I

Communication Skills-I

Notes 8.2 Articles on Sports

1. India’s World Cup Victory: The Measure of a Nation

Saturday, 2 April, 2011
It is 3pm in a small British bar in the tourist state of Goa about 550km south of Bombay – where
the country’s cricketers are harrying Sri Lanka’s batsmen in the early overs of the World Cup
fi nal.

It is 28 years since India last won this most cherished of titles in a nation so crazy about the game.
There are fewer than nine hours to go until it does so again. But we don’t know that yet.
Mohinder Amarnath, the man of the match in the 1983 World Cup, is certain, however, that the
moment has arrived to repeat his team’s success. Every Indian can realise their dreams through

the 11 men on the field today, he says.
He need not have worried. Corrin, the eponymous owner of the Goan bar, is reaching for a brush,
and dipping it into the pot of orange acrylic paint on the table in front of her. She holds the arm of

the little Indian girl in front of her, draws the first rectangle of the national flag, hands the brush
to Sonny, the barman, and watches him draw the white and green stripes. The girl, the daughter
of the beautician who runs the shop upstairs, beams, delighted, and skips away to show off her

affirmation of support for the home team.

In the street outside, a truck thunders by, horn blaring, Indian fl ags fluttering in from the cab. The
picture is repeated across the country; millions are glued to their televisions or radios, donning
their replica shirts, daubing themselves in the national colours. India is partying; each successful
delivery from its bowlers greeted by a round of beating drums. The country that has made cricket

its national game is certain that this year, finally, it will capture the ultimate prize, the World
Cup.
India is certain that this is no more than it is due. It has already celebrated what many in the country
regard as the real fi nal, victory over its most reviled opponent, the notoriously unpredictable –
unless you happen to be a friendly bookmaker – Pakistan team, which on Wednesday managed

to throw away a magnificent bowling performance to lose ignominiously.
And India was desperate for this victory; the humiliation of the Commonwealth Games corruption
scandal was still fresh; the country’s recent diplomatic successes – not least towards a permanent
seat on the UN Security Council – has been overshadowed by fresh concerns about its aspiration
to be regarded as a first world nation.

This is a nation demanding international approval: buoyed by the news that projections now
show it will overtake China as the world’s most populous nation by 2030, there is a sense that its
time has come.
As Saturday dawned, prayers were said, puja [offerings to the gods] were made, anything to
give the Indian team an edge. Across the country, people painted themselves in the blue of the
national team strip or in the orange, white and green of the flag, and prepared to party.

Bars and hotels hiked prices and charged admission to the more rarefied environments. In many
places, TV screens were set up and even when the big screen was not an option, the nation
gathered anywhere that a television was on, peering over each other’s shoulders to catch a
glimpse of the match.

In Corrins’, even Sonny was applauding as Sri Lanka upped the ante in their final overs, smashing

the ball hither and thither. Then a nation of – according to the new census figures – 1.2 billion fell
silent as top batsman Sehwag fell to the second ball of the Indian innings.

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