Once upon a time in Shanti Nagar

"Weekend Ganpati" - this is the term that I have coined for the Ganesh Utsav in my building. This is the sixth year for the celebration since I shifted here and I still fail to understand, after shelling out 500 bucks per family, you get the divine darshan for not more than 2 days. The teenagers are busy with their playstations, girlfirends etc so they dont have the time to organise. A weekend utsav of one and half days is a symbol of changing times in urban india. The point to be noted here is not the inefficiencies of my housing society members, but the way things change from a colony of lower middle class families to a step above and with time.

I still remember the days I spent at Mount Galaxy CHS, my childhood, my schooling days. I used to rush from school as soon as the final bell was heard to attend the afternoon arti at Ganesh Utsav organised by us. We were a bunch of 12-14 yr olds who used to go door-to-door collecting Rs. 20 wonly from families, some reluctant, some bargaining, some generous. The day when the Idol is brought, the entire Building Residents gather around the gallery to catch the glimpse of Lord Ganesha and hailing "Ganpati Bappa Morya!!" as we dance to the dhols of highly negotiated Dhol Teams. We then take the lord to his home, a shoddy room under the water tank on the terrace, modified to seat the Lord. Every year we had different themes of decoration, ranging from snow capped himalayas to Forts to seven wonders, all handcrafted by the baccha party with help from the elders to save money.

The artis and poojas will run for atleast  7 to 10 days. On the last day, we would again Hire a Dhol Team sometimes shared with the neighbour hood Building. Our sardar uncle staying in ground floor would give his tempo for the noble cause of Visarjan. We would all dance till our second last breath, moving at a snails pace to the nearest talao. After an hour of dance-marathon, we would sing the final arati with our throats struggling to gather voice. Then we say the final goodbye to the lord and ask him to come soon next year. While going back riding on the carrier of the empty tempo, we would all discuss sadly, how much fun we had for all the days. We would reach our building, seal prasads in a small zip pack pocket and distribute it to the 84 rooms we had in the building. And finally at night, we would all have a small party, with all the money saved (legally :) ) Those were truly the best days of my life.

Gentleman's Game?

There was a time when British families would come formally dressed to Lord's to enjoy some quality time together and appreciate the stylish cover drives by batsmen in whites from top to toe. They were not boys but Men. The cricketers did had the charm and so did the game.

Circa 2010: The young boys play 20-20 cricket (even retire from the test format for it), earns million of dollars in endorsements of products ranging from colas to innerwears, parties late nights with booze and babes before matches, hires PR agencies to handle media relations, occasionally makes presence at TV shows, Movies, participates in Reality shows during off-season (read:after being dropped).

Cricket has evolved to be an Multi-Billion Dollar Industry from an International Sport. Money, has been the sole driver for cricket for quite some years now. No wonder the highly profitable ICC is not so keen to promote the game to non-playing yet high potential regions like America, China, South East Asia and in Europe. The recent controversies in IPL, spot fixing allegations against Pakistani Players are only evidences supporting the popular belief that Cricket is now more a business of money than a sport. There was a time when I used to get score updates from my school peon who had no better job than listening to running commentary in All India Radio. Now score updates are available on Internet, FM Radio, SMS, even GPRS. Yet my interest towards the game never compels me to check scores as frequently as before. The love is dying with every test/ one day series with Sri Lanka withing few months, with yet another T20 series, with every scandals, with the over-occupied cricket calendar. I still hope, that the good old days will be back, that  I will look forward to the next cricket match and that I will be back asking the stranger sitting besides me in the bus, struggling in the crowd to catch a glimpse of matches standing outside TV showrooms and ask the most FAQ in India, "Arre, score kya hua hai?"