[It’s one of the greatest rivalries
in sports, when war off the field allows it — a contest of national identities
that will be renewed this Sunday in a World Cup match.]
By Mujib Mashal
Face-offs on the cricket field
between India and Pakistan, like the expected encounter on Sunday in Dubai,
have become increasingly rare, a victim of the frosty relationship between the
two nuclear-armed neighbors. For a match to take place at all, even on neutral
ground, players and fans have to hope tensions remain short of war and that the
organizers can weather growing calls for a boycott.
The meeting on Sunday, the first in
two years, comes as part of a World Cup. The rising tensions are tied to a
number of factors — repeated militant attacks in India; the disputed territory
of Kashmir, where India accuses Pakistan of supporting militant groups; and
rising intolerance in both countries — that have almost entirely wiped out any
exchange between two nations that otherwise overlap in shared history, passions
and culture.
But the intensity of passions surrounding
Sunday’s match draw on deeper reservoirs, issues of national identity that are
wrapped into the fortunes of the competing cricket teams.
And despite calls for a boycott
from Indian political leaders after a spasm of violence recently in Kashmir, the
game is going ahead. As India’s cricket organizing body has made clear, the
country cannot simply opt out of an international commitment like this one, the
T20 World Cup — especially one where its team is favored to win.
“We need to maintain a cricketing
bond,” Ramiz Raja, who leads the Pakistan Cricket Board, said after meeting his
Indian counterpart. “Our stance is, ‘The further politics remains from cricket,
the better.’”
But in cricket, a game that can
appear bafflingly complex to the uninitiated, it is precisely those political
fault lines that generate such passionate interest.
Cricket in South Asia is a legacy
of British colonial rule — “an Indian game accidentally discovered by the
British,” as the critic Ashis Nandy once said. The end of that rule saw India
partitioned in 1947, creating Pakistan as a new nation for tens of millions of
the region’s Muslims.
In the 75 years since, the two
countries have gone to war several times, and have remained on a war footing
when not fighting. Sometimes, the tensions have meant the cricket teams didn’t
play each other for a decade or so. Other times, such as during the 1999 World
Cup, they played a match even as they waged a
war over Kashmir.
“It’s tempting to draw parallels
between the story of cricket and the story of India,” Amit Varma, who hosts the
popular podcast “The Seen and the Unseen,” said in a recent episode. “We started out uncertain of our place in
the world, trying to find our feet, hobbled by an inferiority complex, looking
for pride in small consolations, but eventually opening up to the world and
asserting ourselves.”
“Our cricket has flourished to a
point that India dominates this game, especially in a commercial sense,” Mr.
Varma added.
India has become the undisputed
destination for the sport in recent years, with top players from the around
world seeking to play in the lucrative Indian Premier League. The league is
among the top five most profitable sports leagues in the world, and top players
can make as much as $2 million for a two-month season.
But in a sign of the tense times in
the region, Pakistani players are barred from joining the league, depriving
them of a major platform to compete with the world’s best — or to cash in on
some of the riches. The two countries largely cut off bilateral ties after
a deadly
terrorist attack in Mumbai in 2008 by assailants who had come from
Pakistan.
That the occasional games have been
played only in neutral venues for a decade has done away with a major vehicle
of interaction between the two cricket-crazed nations.
Indian and Pakistani players have
often said that every time they play in the other country, the intensity on the
field is matched only by the hospitality off it. Vendors in bazaars would
refuse payments, while the families of the host players would send home-cooked
food to the visiting players in their hotel rooms.
“I had hosted the whole Indian team
at my house — a full spread, of kababs and all,” Shahid Afridi, the former
Pakistani captain, recalled of
one tour more than a decade ago. “When they arrived, I found out they were all
vegetarians. I had to quickly scramble for lentils and vegetables.”
Vicky Luthra, who runs a photo studio in New
Delhi, is such a dedicated fan that he has watched India and Pakistan play four
times, including traveling all the way to England in 2017, where the match
ticket alone cost him about $400.
“I cannot paint my face, I cannot
do every drama. I am a gentleman audience of cricket,” Mr. Luthra said,
smilingly. “But I definitely always wish good luck to India.”
The game he most fondly remembers
is when he crossed the border on foot in 2006 to watch India play in the
Pakistani city of Lahore. He was excited to go — his grandparents hailed from
the part of the country that ended up in Pakistan — but his wife insisted she
would not let him travel alone.
“My wife was very much against
going to Pakistan,” Mr. Luthra said. “But she was surprised by how good it was,
how friendly the people were. It was because of cricket I got to see those
parts.”
For Pakistan, too, the story of its
cricket team at times mirrors the state of affairs in the country — bursts of
brilliance and talent undermined by mismanagement, uncertainty and lack of
opportunity.
Pakistan has been the underdog in
recent years, with India dominating the World Cup face-offs while compiling an
undefeated record. But in the 1980s and 1990s, Pakistan had the kind of talent
that could win bilateral matches frequently, creating heartbreak for the Indian
team’s massive fan following. The country’s current prime minister first made
his name in cricket; he led Pakistan to the World Cup crown in 1992.
This year’s tournament comes at a
time when the mood in Pakistan is “sagging,” their cricket chief, Mr. Raja,
said.
Following a militant attack on the
Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore in 2009, Pakistan went a decade without
hosting a single international match. International teams have slowly begun
touring the country again. But just weeks before the World Cup, New
Zealand abruptly called off its tour because of security concerns, and
England soon followed suit.
In the Pakistani port city of
Karachi, fans prepared for the T20 World Cup match with hopes that their team
could finally reverse India’s domination.
Cricket has many formats, including
a “Test match” that can run as long as five days, and still end in a tie. But
the T20 World Cup is the shortest, each match lasting about three hours, so the
results are more easily swayed by a brief spell of brilliance.
“The pocket Qurans are out, the
memorized holy words are recited and hands are raised for prayers,” Ebad Ahmed,
a journalist based in Karachi, said about some fans seeking divine
intervention. “The idea is to bring God to our team’s side.”
No matter the Pakistani team’s
chances, the game will be a publicly shared experience even for people like
Muzamil Ali, a 33-year-old sales professional who confessed he didn’t even like
cricket. Nevertheless, when it’s India and Pakistan, most people can’t help but
watch — and Mr. Ali plans to take it in on a big screen outdoors.
“Watching a Pakistan-India match
with a crowd is not only fun,” Mr. Ali said, “but also it is better to share
grief with others in case Pakistan loses.”
Zia ur-Rehman contributed
reporting from Karachi, Pakistan.
