Politics: The Modi Pill!

Narendra Modi has become the classic pill that still affects you irrespective of your decision to swallow or not to swallow it. If you ignore the pill you suffer from relapse; if you swallow it and then throw it out you still suffer from wrong diagnosis and if you swallow it with a contented heart you are still not sure of escaping from its side effects.  Greatly relishing the spectacle the Congress party already quipped that the very mention of Narendra Modi’s name had made many BJP stalwarts sick unable to attend Goa meet.

For a change media attention has somewhat shifted from the still raging IPL Spot Fixing scandal and has now been totally focused on Narendra Modi—the Chief Minister of Gujarat famous for his successful development model and arguably the most controversial leader within the national opposition Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Recently there were a few opinion polls on General Elections-2014 that forecast that with Modi as the BJP campaign leader or a declared Prime Ministerial candidate the BJP would much better to possibly form a government at the centre. Besides, Modi has also done exceptionally well in the just concluded by-elections in Gujarat sweeping all the Parliament and Assembly seats. Narendra Modi cannot be ignored anymore. The two-day National Convention of the BJP started in Goa with a pre-Convention agenda meeting yesterday. It has been widely speculated and expected that the party would take a decision this time to make Modi BJP Election Campaign leader or BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate or both.

However, things are far from easy because Narendra Modi’s record of delivering stupendous growth rate and good governance always gets weighed against his fundamentalist leanings or connections and his dubious role during communal riots in his state in 2002. BJP being a party for Hinduism with tacit blessings from various fundamentalist groups notwithstanding, some leaders within its fold vouch for a secular changeover. It knows that it cannot form a government on its own in diverse India and has to play coalition politics for its National Democratic Alliance (NDA) that brought BJP into power in 1998 and then in 1999. The NDA has other parties with secular ideologies and their own Prime Ministerial candidates too. Allies within the NDA has been fighting bitterly during the last two tumultuous years while cornering the ruling coalition again and again on new and newer scams and hardly allowing the Indian Parliament to perform. In this complex era of confrontational politics the basic reason for infighting is still Narendra Modi.

Several senior, competent and ambitious leaders within BJP make things murkier. There are two main groups—anti-Modi led by veteran LK Advani with the support of leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Shusma Swaraj, Jaswant Singh, Yashwant Sinha, Venkaiyya Naidu etc, and the pro-Modi group led by BJP national President Rajnath Singh with the support of leader of opposition in Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley, Goa Chief Minister Manohar Parikkar, for BJP President Nitin Gadkari, Rajiv Pratap Rudi and others. Speculation has reached fever pitch with several anti-Modi BJP leaders including LK Advani deciding against attending Goa convention.

The BJP must understand that it must put up a Modified front, must present a tolerably united alliance and must desist from petty politics, if it seriously wants to aim at forming a government after the 2014 General Elections.  

Champions Trophy: India Beat South Africa In A Close Encounter!

Shikhar Dhawan

India beat South Africa by 26 runs in the first one day international of the ICC Champions Trophy at Cardiff in Wales on Thursday. It was a high scoring entertainer with both teams getting more than 300 runs each. It was the first one day match at Cardiff where the team batting first won and the chasing team also crossed 300 runs for the first time. Maybe due to the new one-day cricket rules the Cardiff pitch made its reputation of being a batting one a little stronger.

On a windy and chilly morning South Africa won the toss and put India in. India made a rollicking start thanks to a opening partnership of 127 runs between Shikhar Dhawan and Rohit Sharma who opened as Murli Vijay was rested. A sensational new-find Dhawan went on to score his maiden one-day century (114) and was around till the 38^th over. The initial momentum of the innings was maintained throughout despite fall of too many wickets in the latter phase. The target of 332/7 looked mammoth and decisive, but the Cardiff pitch did not flinch an inch. A late charge by all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja (47 not out) helped achieving the big total.

South Africa started shakily, but soon raced to a commanding position thanks to a well-paced partnership between Peterson (68) and AB deVilliers (70). The run-out of Peterson proved to be a turning point putting the match back in India’s favor. However, the highest individual score was yet to come. All-rounder McLaren played a ruthlessly effortless innings of 71 and with good contributions from others again threatened to snatch the match away. Exceptional Indian fielding and effectively utilized spinners finally sealed the victory for Team India. South Africa maintained a terrific run-rate throughout enough for winning the game, but lost too many wickets for the effort. They ended up for 305 giving a margin to 26 runs which hardly set the rivals wide apart. The Scorecard:

A new-look Team India rocked by spot fixing and all cross connections and corruption did quite well to start with a win. They can rest and regroup well for the next match.

Cricket And Fixing: ICC Champions Trophy Begins!

The ICC Champions Trophy-2013 in England and Wales begins with the inaugural match between India and South Africa today. At a time when cricket or more specifically Indian cricket has been hyped to the height by the media for all the wrong reasons. The raging IPL Spot or Match Fixing scandal has cast a shadow of grievous doubt on players of Team India, its bosses and administrators. Fittingly enough Team India has a captain who had been right royally gagged by his corrupt cricket Board bosses and the right royally loyal captain has been obsequiously  observing the gag order even in England. Add to this his alleged conflict of interest concerning a management firm where he acquired stakes and put in his favorite cricketers as clients for whom he enjoyed the absolute authority of selection for the national team. Why bother! His cricket Chief had a more sinister conflict of interest with his son-in-law—the boss of an IPL franchise CSK captained by the Indian national captain—in jail and yet nobody dared ask him to resign. Therefore finally it is the ‘conflict of interest’ for the genuine Indian cricket fans who will continue to have doubt over all the possible results for India—victory, loss or tie. Only abandonment of matches due to rains is above doubt, because rains cannot possibly be fixed!

However, from the extremely ‘cricket’ part of the scenario Team India seems to be in a good nick for the tournament after winning the first warm-up match against Sri Lanka and crushing Australia in the second. But the top order batting is yet to deliver, and it was largely thanks to Dinesh Karthik and captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni himself plus the young Indian fast bowlers. Like India South Africa is also a line-up of young and relatively inexperienced players, but more worryingly without the services of Graeme Smith and Jacques Kallis who opted out due to personal reasons. While all Indian players have benefited from the ‘cricket’ of IPL despite the mess, the South African ‘cricket’ stalwart of IPL Dale Steyn also looks doubtful. Cardiff pitch is likely to help both batting and pace bowling, and considering Indian vulnerability to pace in greener pitches South Africa still could dominate India. Tagged as ‘perennial chokers’ in big tournaments South Africa too could crumble if Indian batsmen and fast bowlers deliver. Fixing or no fixing any of the three possible results are immensely plausible in this big match.

Another ‘cricketing’ highlight of the ICC Champions Trophy-2013 is the new set of rules for one-day cricket becoming effective from this tournament. As a big help to bowlers now there will be two new balls from both wicket ends which may of course negate out reverse swing and the bowlers can now bowl two legal bouncers an over. The other rules are; five fielders will have to kept within thirty yard circle throughout the matches and there will only two sets of powerplays—the first mandatory ten overs followed by the batting powerplay that will have to be taken before the 40^th over.

So then, there is lot of ‘cricket’ despite fixing. What if all cricket legends who still maintain ‘loyal silence’ flocking back to egg you onto cricket! What if all the ‘paid to comment’ cricket experts flocking back to take you ahead in the encounters! You are still absolutely your own master to decide what to do with ‘cricket’ and ‘fixing’!

As for the ‘fixing’ part, Gurunath Meiyappan and Vindoo Dara Singh were granted conditional bail by a court in Mumbai on 4^th June even after being remanded to judicial custody till 14^th June on 3^rd June. More hopefully, Delhi Police had applied MCOCA (Maharashtra Control of Organized Crime Act-19990 against all 26 bookies and cricketers including Sreesanth on June 4. This will enable Delhi Police to file charge-sheets within six months and the accused will be able to plea for bail for at least one month. Since yesterday interrogation of the boss of Rajasthan Royals (RR) and his business associates by Delhi Police has been going on. As per latest reports Delhi Police say that RR Boss Raj Kundra, husband of joint owner and Bollywood actor Shilpa Shetty, had confessed to placing bets on his own team and his passport had been seized. After Gurunath of CSK Kundra becomes the second team boss who have been used to betting on their own teams revealing strategic information to the bookies.