Champions and The Morning After…

India won the Cricket World Cup 2011 last night and there were unprecedented celebrations all over the country. People flocked to streets shouting slogans and cheering for India and showering praises on MS Dhoni – captain of the Indian Cricket team and rooting for his leadership qualities.

In his word to the nation in the presentation ceremony that followed after the match, MSD did mention that had India lost, he would have been stoned with numerous difficult questions about the choice of Sreesanth instead of R.Ashwin and the changes in the batting order revealing the fact that the Indian masses are equally quick about worshipping their heroes and pulling them down. The effigies are burnt as easily as the hoardings and posters are raised.

There was a lot of speculation about the winners and which way the game would go before it began and news channels and TV reporters had a great day just talking about who would play what part during the game and this changed to a mad race of complimenting players and getting their sound bytes once the game was won. Clearly, this was not just a game, it wasn’t just any other tournament and it wasn’t just your everyday run of the mill TV coverage. The emotions which ran after the match were definitely not fake. On one hand you saw the veteran Tendulkar being carried by the team mates in sheer exultation and respect that only can be associated with legends and the little master himself being jubilant and excited as a school boy, on the other hand the likes of Yuvraj, Harbhajan and even the skipper had welled up eyes. It just wasn’t any other win.

But as I sit on this quiet Sunday morning and flip through the news channels, I see the same mad footage of people toppling over each other to get into the frame of the TV cameras and shouting for India, the emotions inside me are a little subdued than last night. Come tomorrow and I am expecting similar conversations and chatting in the office cafeteria and I guess the frenzy would die down after a day or two, Probably the media shall continue on the same line for another week or so and the noise on the TV too would settle down. People would go back to their mundane lives once again, the politicians would try and search for another distraction to keep people’s attention away from the vital issues of corruption, price rise and inefficient bureaucracy and India shall live another day, another week, month and another year in the same fashion as it did before April 2, 2011.

The morning after silences all warriors. The battlefield lays barren and the victors sleep in their tents after a gale of laughter, frolicking and boisterous dancing a night before. They were lauded and glorified last night but the rising sun brings in another day – perhaps another battle, perhaps the soothing lull needed for normalcy. The triumphs are cast in stone and set aside, maybe to look at another day for deriving some lessons out of it and for now, we shall return to the expectedness and the ways of life which prevailed before. However, let us bow down once again to the apex moment of celebration for the Indian Cricket in years to come.

Well done, India.