Gossipmongers Inc.

Sanjeeta just happened to mention this morning that Ronaldo was being bartered for some 60 million pounds. It started me off on this whole thing about how these popular sports like Football and Cricket have become blood-chillingly commercial. I think the politics of it along with the commercial aspect is what put me off Cricket. If I were to be very specific I would say the original break happened during the world cup of 1994 when Hanse Cronje, my favorite, was involved in a Match Fixing scam. That was long back and the game has changed since then. The new IPL series is a worse affront I think than anything that ever happened to the game before. I do not follow Cricket anymore and I am actually proud of saying that!

Well yes... I am talking about Baichung Bhutia who became another reality TV star from the "far corner of the country"! His winning the competition (Jhalak Dikhlaja) did not come as a surprise to many of us. Rather it was more like a rerun of the Tamang or Sourabhee episodes from Indian Idol!
In the first few performances, Baichung or "not my Baichung" (as one of the judges puts it), could not move to save his life!! The "chance pe dance kar le" sequence was more of a skin show than skills! Yes of course, Baichung did show off his little foot-balling skills at the end of the dance sequence which strictly speaking hardly qualified him as a dancer. It was much later in the competition that he actually learned to move (thanks to Sonia Jaffer!!). He gradually moved from a footballer learning the ABC's of dance to Vairabhi's and Saroj Khan's favourite soccer star who can actually dance! The journey was quite dramatic like any other reality TV shows. And the crowd (including myself, ahem!) was glued to the TV set or computer screen (in my case!!) every time this soccer star showed his foot-work on the dance floor! For most of us, it was more like an amusement... Believe me, I did not watch the shows because he was a good dancer but… just because of the mere amusement of watching Baichung trying to tune into and synchronise with the sensational Sonia with whom he shared an awesome chemistry (wonder what Madhuri would say about this...).
Baichung (am not talking about Sonia) actually showed some 'real' footwork with his samba, which was actually good. There was energy and, his body language improved much. And by the end of the show (31st May 2009) that is after some more dance sequences, Baichung had learned to dance... Watch the last episode and you will know what I meant (one of my friends messaged me saying that she was impressed by his improvement in the field!).
Anyway Baichung won! Though the judges decided that Gauhar was a better dancer, the public voted Baichung as the best…
All the same, the plot was quite predictable from the beginning of the competition even with all the dramatic twists and turns! But what more could have gotten the perfect 10, if not for the lesser known Football star from the “exotic corner of the country” winning the title! Baichung’s storyline reminds you of Amit Paul, Debojit and Sourabhee! Baichung (like I had told some of my friends) had everything going his way: an Indian soccer star! The soccer star had all the elements of a good masala flick… rags to riches story, the only Indian soccer star (not that soccer is a one man game!!), Soccer, the underdog element, anthropological features and nativity, exoticism and the list goes on… But this ‘cute’ footballer with an “always smiling and supportive wife” stole the hearts of all the young girls with rosy dreams… Added to that, the in-time controversy with Mohan Bagan gave him the much needed publicity (I wonder if his stint with the English second division side FC Bury got him as many fan following as it did after this show).
Nevertheless, it is quite interesting to note that since the last three four years the “Stars” from the far corner are making their presence felt! Whether they deserved it or not is not the question here… but the attention the region and the people from the region has received in these last few years makes me wonder if this would actually help in bringing the region closer to the mainstream or strain the relations further.