IPL: Reasons why it annoys the shit out of me

Yay! Look SRK... look Juhi Chawla and Gauri Khan... look-look SRK's kids... omigawd, SRK is dancing to the wicket that player whose name I am sure he doesn't know, just took. Oh, this is too much entertainment. I am exhausted by all that passion... I think I will faint.

That is roughly the delirium that unfolds around me as I try to duck under some rock till this garish explosion of the most perverse kind of intellectual bankruptcy blows over. There are so many reasons why I abhor it that unless I take a deep breath before I rant, I'll have a stroke and die.

(takes a deep breath)

Firstly, I hate the way the BCCI has flexed its muscles to bulldoze this shit into out lives. I mean has anybody ever wondered by IPL is getting headlines & prime-time slots and why the ICL made only a 2-inch column on the "Other News" in the Sports sections of most newspapers.

Not that ICL itself is martyr or anything (that's a different story altogether) but it just makes me sad that in a country where the media prides itself on its "neutrality" and "fairness" - they arbitrarily decide to boycott ICL for getting coverage rights for the IPL. Surely, a tournament which boasts of a "who's who" of cricket by itself deserves more attention in a cricket-crazy nation.

Secondly, it just makes my blood boil to see Preity Zinta selling IPL tickets for "her" team and field questions about women's equality and how she's holding her own in a "man's world" while in the background a 7-year old girl walks a tightrope and performs acrobatic feats to keep the IPL fans "entertained" while they wait for their ticket.

Btw, the tickets were being sold for Rs 8000 each, while the little girl was reportedly being paid a mere thousand bucks to risk her neck & spine for "entertaining" these people. Women's equality ambassador? Bullshit? Anyone?

I am all for libertarian economics, but there is a small sub-text of exploitation that runs through this whole jamboree that it makes rationalizing these things a little more of a difficult task.

Thirdly, the plain hypocrisy with which the BCCI says that they are "promoting cricket" in India is astounding. Here is a small list of extremely talented cricketers from India who in an ideal world should have seen more of the national team -

Abhishek Jhunjhunwala, Ambati Rayadu, Deep Dasgupta, Dinesh Mongia, Hemang Badani, Reetinder Singh Sodhi, Rohan Gavaskar, TP Singh, etc.

Anybody who has followed even a little bit of Ranji cricket, most names would ring familiar bells. Unfortunately they'll never be seen in the Indian national team... or the BCCI XI. A little known fact, the team we so unabashedly cheer for in the world cup, etc has nothing to do with the Indian nation.

In a landmark judgement by the supreme court a few years ago - the cricket team as fielded in these tournaments are the exclusive property of BCCI and not the Indian nation.

Fourthly, what does a knight rider even mean?

All the King's men...

Knight-Riders? Like "riders" of Knights? Is it me or does it sound like there is an innuendo of some twisted and extremely kinky medieval homosexual fantasy happening here? And then it says "All the King's men". To best of my knowledge Kolkata never had Knights and the last "King" to rule over it briefly was Siraj-ud-Daulah before Lord Clive re-took the city during the Battle of Plassey. Surely Kolkata with such a rich and proud heritage could have offered better symbols of nomenclature.

Similarly, the Rajasthan Royals, Kings XI Punjab. Chennai SuperKings. What Kings? What royalty? Where? Or better still, my personal favorite - Bangalore Royal Challengers. Bravo.

What is pissing off is that the owners have tried to create a branding maelstrom around their teams to create a "cult following". What follow are shamelessly blatant branding techniques done to death - music videos, PR appearances, blanket hoardings, TV bites and media spots. Sad bit is people are buying it.

Imagine seeing a Bangalore citizen and identifying yourself with an premium whiskey brand or being Kolkata guy and living with yourself as a "King's [SRK] man - a Knight rider".

Lastly, with IPL and ICL, the economics of the corporates firmly enters the domain of cricket - the last bastion of any kind of proud sporting prowess in our country. Pretty soon you'd be having Provogue presents "Kings XI Punjab Party Wear" or the Reliance "Mumbai Indians Credit Card" or something. With cricketers making unheard of salaries, nobody will be expected to take Ranji Trophy and all seriously.

Not to mention the hog that is BCCI, it will prevent the development of similar league experiments elsewhere and throttle the game itself. While it does so, hordes of twenty-somethings will sit in front of the television with their Pepsi/Coke in their hand and scream their lungs hoarse on some misplaced concept of identifying with a "tribe".

It took English soccer, a proper century to become the life, blood and passion of a people. The problem is we all envy it so much, that we are ready to make massive fools of ourselves for getting a part of that in our lives.

If only we looked in the right places more often.