Cricket바카라the very word conjures up a serene winter바카라s day바카라the plucky exploits of men in white바카라windscreens billowing in the wind바카라the 바카라plock바카라 of bat meeting ball바카라wild cheering of spectators바카라the lengthening shadow creeping across the ground in harmony to the waning sun (rain-splotched English summers be damned)바카라. Yet, with its increasing hold on people, this idealised arcadia took on the contours of faith; when bands of eleven 바카라represented바카라 countries, patriotic pride and its handmaiden, nationalism, reared its head. When 바카라incidents바카라 and controversies on the field went out of hand, statecraft had to be deployed to stanch the flow of passion. On the other hand, diplomacy has taken recourse to cricket, to use its immense goodwill and its incredible reach into every nook and cranny.
Is Cricket The Perfect Tool To Foster Diplomacy? An Emphatic Answer Is Still Awaited
India and Pakistan have used cricket to mend ties. The threat to boycott a World Cup match after attack on Indian security forces in Pulwama was a new tactics
Elements of all this can be plainly seen as the ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 edges to its mid-point: the colourful fervour, raw emotions, exemplary sportsmanship and바카라controversies. Last week, the International Cricket Council (ICC) officially requested the BCCI to have the small insignia on Mahendra Singh Dhoni바카라s gloves to be removed. An honorary lt. colonel in the parachute regiment of the Territorial Army, the dagger with the wings insignia is similar to the para forces바카라 badge, and therefore in breach of the ICC regulations that players can바카라t wear anything that is related to 바카라political, religious or racial activities or causes바카라. Indeed, shades of politics have always coloured cricket, despite efforts to keep it clear of its innate political undercurrents.
Though 바카라cricket diplomacy바카라 is a much-implemented soft power tool in South Asia, specifically involving India and Pakistan, the game바카라s most heartwarmingly positive influence in recent years has to do with the Afghanistan national team, whose mature display of prodigious talent belies its cricketing infancy. The Soviet invasion in 1979, the Mujahideen fightback and victory, the Taliban ascendancy and their post-9/11 defeat and vicious struggle against US-led forces meant Afghanistan remained a war-torn country for decades, with many of its brutalised populace spilling over its borders in Pakistan, housed in camps in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and in Karachi. Consequently, cricket was the predominant sport that was played in Afghan refugee camps in Peshawar. From all accounts, the game had been as much a psychological coping mechanism as physical activity. A unifying medium to mould nationalist identity, in the 2000s Afghanistan went about installing the formal framework to form a national team; by 2017 they were awarded full member status by the ICC.
The Afghan and Indian teams at the former바카라s first Test in Bangalore in 2018.
Last year, at its historic first Test series against India, both Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani바카라s opening statements identified the sport as a unifying force, noting the Afghanistan team바카라s nation-building potential in the face of 바카라challenging and difficult circumstances바카라. India, too, has granted Afghanistan the use of the Greater Noida stadium outside Delhi for training purposes, and an additional facility in Dehradun, Uttarakhand, along with $2 billion in developmental programmes.
Evolutionarily speaking, sports are a practical means of channelling aggression through less violent outlets. It is in maintaining this precarious balance that makes cricket, steeped in colonial history, a suspicious vehicle for peddling peace. Yet, India and Pakistan have often used cricket as an extension to the talks table, as a means to break ice.
바카라Cricket has always played a crucial role in bilateral India-Pakistan ties. In 2004 when we toured Pakistan, the team was excellently welcomed and experienced much warmth from people. The fact that the boys were playing a crucial role as ambassadors was not lost on them and they behaved in accordance,바카라 says former cricketer Kiran More who was chairman of the selection committee then.
If the 2004 바카라Peace Tour바카라 was a notable example of then PM Atal Behari Vajpayee using cricket for international diplomacy, a similar programme had been previously attempted in 1979 under the Morarji Desai government, where Vajpayee was foreign minister. In 2004, as attempts were made 바카라to establish peaceful, friendly and cooperative relations바카라, including the Samjhauta Express resuming operations, it was thought that the Indian team바카라s tour of Pakistan would bolster amity. Perhaps that바카라s why on the heels of a momentous tour with Australia, the Men in Blue had to embark on another one with Pakistan. It was a resounding success.
While a cricket tour between the two nations elicited sportsmanship바카라much of which ripened into lasting friendships바카라among the players, it wasn바카라t always the same for fans, spectators, even occasionally the political class. In 1952, when Pakistan first toured India under the captaincy of Abdul Hafeez Kardar, it was to a tense welcome. Two years later, when India reciprocated that visit under the leadership of Vinoo Mankad, the reaction was equally circumspect. National feelings post-1947 had seeped into cricket, with passionate fans on both sides of the border regarding a match as proxy war. The wars of 바카라65 and 바카라71 forced a gap of 17 years when the two countries didn바카라t play each other. Only in 1978 did cricket resume, becoming a driving force for bilateral goodwill. India-Pakistan ties, as is known, moves in cycles. A further diplomatic use of cricket was availed of by former president Zia ul-Haq in 1987, during Pakistan바카라s tour to India. After a lukewarm 바카라90s, cricketing ties snapped after the Kargil conflict in 1999, to be lifted in the noughties. However, that wouldn바카라t last: political compulsions meant an ice age was to clamped down again바카라something that continues. Surely, the repetitive start-and-stops in India-Pakistan cricket relations have made the sport the unofficial barometer measuring ties between the states.
Because of international cricket바카라s wide appeal and saturation coverage by the media, it has been subject to violence too, as it was in March 2009, when the Sri Lankan team came under attack on their way to the Qadaffi stadium for a Test match against Pakistan. On the heels of the Mumbai terror attacks, Pakistan copped a lot of blame for the incident, and international cricket hasn바카라t still returned to Pakistan, doing irreparable damage to the game there.
It is, however, fair to say that in a cricketing balance sheet of good pitted against the unsavoury, the forces of goodwill has triumphed. Cricket has empowered peoples subjected to the indignity of colonialism in India, Pakistan, West Indies and South Africa, becoming a veritable statement of equality where oppressors were beaten at their own game. South Africa was for a long time boycotted by the cricket world because of its apartheid policies, and in 1992 India, led by Mohammed Azharuddin, welcomed a post-apartheid South Africa into the global cricketing fold. 바카라It was historic because India was the first country to extend their hand to South Africa,바카라 says More.
For all the fellow-feeling, politics does impinge on cricket. After the Pulwama attacks, India threatened to boycott its match against Pakistan in the World Cup. This was a new spin on the state use of cricket바카라a bid to increase pressure and bring about political action through lateral means. Once used as a tool to foster good ties, is cricket amenable to hard-nosed diplomacy? An emphatic answer, like a crisply struck cover drive, is still awaited.