Should India play cricket with Pakistan? Or no?
Every time I hear this debate, I ask myself whether it should.
This is one of those subjects regarding which I don’t have a strong opinion, one way or the other - very rare since I usually have my confident opinion on almost every subject.
With time, some have grown, some have gone and some are born. Others have remained the same.
Those that have remained the same have grown from poorly founded to well founded. On books, movies, conversations and endless reflection.
But not on fashion. Never.
Not political correctness. No peer pressure. Never.
One of these days I decided I must develop an opinion on this subject too. Our exchange with Pakistan. And I did.
Here I am, logging it.
As long as the players, be they artists, singers, actors, painters or musicians, are individuals, and not representatives of the state, and visit us in their individual capacities, there should be no objection to cultural exchange. Oh! How I love Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, and those few gems from Adnan Sami, and what I would have missed if…
However, if they are representatives of the state, batting for their state, literally or metaphorically, which cricket players are, we must not have anything to do with them.
There goes my stand. Done.
Every time I hear this debate, I ask myself whether it should.
This is one of those subjects regarding which I don’t have a strong opinion, one way or the other - very rare since I usually have my confident opinion on almost every subject.
With time, some have grown, some have gone and some are born. Others have remained the same.
Those that have remained the same have grown from poorly founded to well founded. On books, movies, conversations and endless reflection.
But not on fashion. Never.
Not political correctness. No peer pressure. Never.
One of these days I decided I must develop an opinion on this subject too. Our exchange with Pakistan. And I did.
Here I am, logging it.
As long as the players, be they artists, singers, actors, painters or musicians, are individuals, and not representatives of the state, and visit us in their individual capacities, there should be no objection to cultural exchange. Oh! How I love Rahat Fateh Ali Khan, and those few gems from Adnan Sami, and what I would have missed if…
However, if they are representatives of the state, batting for their state, literally or metaphorically, which cricket players are, we must not have anything to do with them.
There goes my stand. Done.
7 comments:
I agree. I don't think the new Pak PM has the balls to take a stand on ceasefire violations by Pak army. No sport until peace.
New PM or old, PAK is an enemy. Yesterday, Today and a hundred years from now. Whenever you have second thoughts about this, just think of Captain Saurav Kalia and the torture meted out to him.
By the way, I was about to write Pak enemy... a thousand years from now, but I don't think Pak will exist that long so I wrote hundred years instead. I hope and pray this turns out to be prophetic. Amen!
No second thoughts. On the contrary, I always feel that India should have snatched Lahore in '65 and some more in '71. Amen to the prayer.
In this post you have spoken logically, be careful these are signs of becoming an anti-national.
I am full of surprises...the more you know me, the more you will be surprised.
As for using labels, it was started by the Chrislamocommie bastards and their supporters. Right wing, Hindutva, Saffron, Saffronization, Cow belt. So what are the opponents to do? Just keep quiet? They coined another set of labels to counter these - sickular, Aaptard, pseudo secular, Presstitute, urban naxal, anti national, Tukde Tukde... totally useful and powerful ones. Gave them a taste of their own medicine, double the dose.
Not knowing how to counter the power and influence of these, the leftists cry 'polarization', 'intolerance'!
How serendipitous the timing of stumbling upon this blog post could be . You wrote it on Aug 28th , 2018 and with Pulwana attacks this is so so relevant .
You have hit the nail on its head , its hard to seperate state and its action and the culture and people . Being a 2nd Generation Partition impacted punjabi family , I was fed on stories of horrendous , heart wrenching tales of murders and rapes . That said , I developed a love for Urdu and Ghazals at 19 and run a Ghazal masterclass. I had attendees who thought I was pushing "Pakistani" culture . Nothing could be more muddied . Urdu is NOT a pakistani proprietary . They remain militant , unreasonable and illogical . They need boycotting to the core .
That said , sadly the killers of 1984 (i have seen those riots with my own eyes ) are siding with the same folks and proving they are no less militant , unreasonable and illogical .
We must cut the cord to make the stand unambiguous .
It was my Sanskrit teacher in school with strong RSS leaning who had said, 'Urdu is a beautiful language'. I recently purchased two books online to learn Urdu.
Old Hindi film music is my life blood and it is replete with Urdu words and phrases. I understand most of it but I wish to understand it one hundred percent.
Post a Comment