Dada

Well dada means a lot of things. To me, it means my elder brother Sambaran. To many of the people, in a typical work/society the elder Bengali will be called a Dada. In the roads of Bengal, till sometime back, it was the same as Anna of Chennai or Swami of mangalore. But ofcourse, most likely if you ask anybody, who is Dada, the answer will be: Who else but Sourav Ganguly.

It took some time for me to accept his popularity. I always thought it’s only West Bengal, and seems the truth is not very different. I have even seen many people getting jealous. ( but pretending to be either angry or disgusted or as a big shot of cricket and denounce him). But this is the truth, the way Ganguly is adored in West Bengal, no body will ever be adored in any part of India.

As they say, you have to be there to feel it. I don’t get many chances to go to Kolkata and which coincides with some cricket match, but it is a sight to watch. The whole time Dada is on crease (which thankfully is generally not much), is like some last moments of world cup final. People observe every movement of his, will do ‘ishhh’ on his misses and jump on his fours and sixes. It’s just amazing being with all of these. You can’t dislike him anymore.

Ofcourse then, it’s quite obvious, that Chapell will be considered villain. No way can people forgive him when he did something that bad to their won dada. But it was poor Dravid who also got the wrath of the people for no good reason, simply because he was the one who replaced dada. When I tried to discuss any cricket in these lines with any common person (not some very jaankar kind of), it seemed I am a fool if I think otherwise that Chapell may be right, dravid may be good.

The guy who comes out clean in this case and for that matter any controversy, is Sachin. At a position, when he can command anything he wants, they way he never shows his temper and maintains his image is simply amazing. No wonder people refer him as the God.

Anyway, coming back to Ganguly, I now realize, that the reason for his popularity is that he has been the only achiever for Bengal for a long long time. Amartya Sen, though a Bengali has been too long outside to be considered a son of soil, and so are Arundhati, Jhumpa, Rani, Sushmita or Bipasha. Though you see almost half of the reporters in the news channels as Bengalis (leading the pack ofcourse is Sagarika Ghosh) they are all what we call “Probashi Bangali”s. To add to it, the Bengal politics is in a mess, the govt is in the hands of people whos average age is 70+ and the opposition is a lady who has left her brains somewhere long ago. The recent situations in Nandigram makes matter even worse. In all this, the only good thing that has happened to West Bengal in last 15 years is just Dada. No wonder then why Bengalis react to him this way.

Before I end, just as an unrelated note, have any of you read the recent reports of peaceful demonstrations in Kolkata, which was described as a march by the intelligentsia, the writers, the film personalities and the socialites. I just wonder who constitute the intelligentsia :)