Who’s Afraid of Playing in India

IPL is high-profile. And terrorists look for profile. But an exported tournament is like tandoori chicken on a braai grill. “Janata ne kahaan ‘na’,” is the defining line of a mobile phone advertisement. But, we know that in real life it is the government that is all powerful. When it came to the IPL, Chidu ne kaha ‘na’ and that was that. The tournament had to emigrate to South Africa. The league will now taste like tandoori chicken cooked on a braai grill. The obvious consequence of this is panic among international athletes over travel to India. Driving back from training on smooth, stress-free First World roads, more and more are beginning to see India as a dangerous place. Soon after the attack on Sri Lankan cricketers in Lahore, English players pulled out of the Indian Open badminton tournament in Hyderabad. But we still retained the right to be outraged. We are different, we could say. But with Indians themselves choosing to conduct their premier sporting extravaganza outside the country, we cannot appear peeved when someone like Lleyton Hewitt, the fading Australian tennis player, expresses trepidation over travelling to Chennai for a Davis Cup tie in May. He wants to play at a neutral venue or in Australia. The All India Tennis Association has refused. We must find a way to convince the sporting world that India is indeed a different country. If Pakistan is Slash of Guns ’n’ Roses at his destructive peak, India is Tom Hanks. Also, the IPL is a special case. It is an exceptionally large, hectic event that most other sports or entertainment events in India are not. It comprises eight teams and almost as many venues. And it’s very high-profile. Profile matters to terrorists. Tournaments like the Davis Cup are much smaller, played in a single venue and present a smaller, guardable risk. The Davis Cup tie will be fought among just two teams, just ten players. The duration is only about a week. For India, it is a tricky situation with no single standard answer or approach. Each event would require fresh analysis on the basis of its size and format. It is a situation which calls for the public to understand the quandary of athletes. It calls for administrators to provide them all the security they can. But it also calls from players or administrators sensible solutions, not knee jerk responses which are gutless, unwise or manipulative. A look at sport history could put those fretting over an impending visit to India at some ease. After the horror of 26 November, India hosted quite a few international events without incident—tests against England, the Chennai Open tennis championship, the Mumbai marathon and the India Open badminton. And they will be reminded that the worst act of sports terrorism took place not in Asia but Munich during the 1972 Olympics. The temporary transfer of IPL will be hard to live down. But there is a good side to everything. With no moral police around, the cheerleaders can wear whatever they want.