Adil Najam
The news is too fresh, murky on the details, and still developing, but as Adnan Ahmed has just pointed out on the comments section of another post, Pakistan walked out of — and therefore possibly forfeited — the 4th Cricket Test against England at the Oval, in a dramatic turn of events. Then, it was announced that Pakistan will take the field… but just as the crowd begins to cheer, the umpires decide they will not come out if the Pakistan team does. Meanwhile the light keeps deteriorating. No matter how this ends, this will be a drama to remember.
More and developing details are available here. Best place to stay informed on this is CrickInfo.Com, from where the photograph above is are linked. (Updated after original posting).
Maybe Ramesh is right and the South Asian, desi, ‘izzat’ is much more fragile than others. According to the ICC, since the new fine rules were introduced the highest number of fines have been placed on Indian players, the second highest is Sri Lanka and third is Pakistan. Maybe it is in our masallas.
The only other time that a game became an ‘izzat ka masala’ was India v. South Africa in 2001 – but that was at a much bigger and uglier scale than this. It was eerily similar. A bunch of Indian players were accused of cheating. People in India began burning effigies of Mike Denness, the match referee, Indian politicians were crying hoarse about racism and diverting attention from domestic political troubles, accusations were flying, and people were writing about how no other team would ever act like that and everyone else would just accept the umpires decisions. Obviously, they did not know about the South Asian ‘izzat’. I am just glad that Pakistan showed more class, grace and courage under pressure. This, I think, is one situation were we should NOT learn from India.
This from respected Indian magazine Frontline ( http://www.hinduonnet.com/fline/fl1825/18251220.ht m ):
“The Indian anger, that had been simmering for quite some time, boiled over.
The media highlighted the episode and there was much anger on the streets back home. With politicians getting into the picture, talk of racial discrimination started doing the rounds. The issue had snowballed into a crisis.
…
The controversy then took a dangerous turn. The BCCI, in a clear act of defying the world body, and the United Cricket Board of South Africa (UCBSA), influenced by financial considerations, decided to do away with Denness and appointed Denis Lindsay as the match referee for the third Test at Centurion. The ICC moved swiftly. It declared the match ‘unofficial’ and withdrew its panel umpire George Sharpe from the game.
…
THE incident also revealed that India needed to mature as a sports-loving nation. Indian supporters clearly overreacted. The issue was without doubt a highly charged one, still there can be no excuse for angry mobs burning effigies of Denness.”
I think the reaction from Imran Khan and the fury this issue is generating in Pakistan only reaffirms my theory about the ‘post honor’ world espoused by famed Islamic scholar Akbar Ahmed. It is akin to the controversy that the Mohammad cartoons generated a while ago. Read this story, where Imran calls Hair a ‘mini-Hitler’ – you have got to read between the lines here, as Hitler could mean someone dictatorial, but also someone who is a rascist. This is a great opportunity for the beleagured Musharraf Govt to rally people behind a single cause. Where are the mullahs? Why are they not organizing a mass demonstration against the west and a ban on western products?
http://www.cbc.ca/story/sports/national/2006/08/21 /cricket-pakistan.html
here is Geoff Boycott, writing in The Telegraph (UK):
“The ICC must be blind or stupid not to have realised that there is history between Darrell Hair, the umpire who accused them of changing the nature of the ball, and Pakistan. There were mutterings after the Headingley Test that Pakistan didn’t like Hair’s attitude.
There were also incidents in the Test series against England in Pakistan before Christmas when Hair warned Danish Kaneria for running on the pitch when he was bowling and Salman Butt for a similar offence while batting.
Inzamam-ul-Haq was given run out when he tried to get out of the way of a shy at the stumps by Steve Harmison. Pakistan thought Inzamam was taking evasive action and that Hair should not have referred it to the third umpire.
Pakistan regard Hair as an officious umpire and they don’t like his style of man-management. It should have been obvious to the ICC that appointing him to this series created a situation like a volcano waiting to erupt.”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/main.jhtml?xml=/s port/2006/08/21/scboyc21.xml
Adnan – I agree with you that the outcome of the test did not matter in a situation like this.
However, I’m not entirely sure why the Pakistani team reversed their earlier decision and decided to return. Some questions:
Did Shehreyar Khan force the captain and his team to take to the field after realizing the gravity of the situation and was it too late?
Was it Inzamam’s decision to stay away or what is the PCB’s decision? I think it was the later.
Why did they wait until tea to express their protest?
Why not leave as soon as the penalty runs were granted?
When Shereyar Khan says that the country was insulted, it drives home the point I was making earlier. He is a diplomat, mind you and the guy is a cool head. He is no brash army general who is hell bent on seeking an apology. I think he convinced the PCB and the team to return, but then it was all over.
Any other team would have probably abided by the decision of the umpires and returned to the field to avoid a showdown. But in the post honour world, when ‘Izzat’ rules supreme and when Shereyar says the things he does and racial ovetones are assigned to what was an otherwise routine umpiring decision, things get out of control and that is what happened at the Oval.
From dawn’s latest. Read the second last sentence from PCB chief! It is shocking!
Cricket-Pakistan to refuse to play under umpire Hair: PCB KARACHI, Aug. 21 (Reuters) Shaharyar Khan, the Chairman of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB), said Monday the board would not accept Australian umpire Darrell Hair for any future matches. Shaharyar said the Pakistan team, both boards and even the match referee wanted to resume the test. “Even the match referee, Mike Proctor, was keen that somehow the match should be held on the final day and that some flexibility was needed to be shown by the umpires. But Hair refused to listen to anyone,” he said. “We were also willing to give in writing that the umpires were entitled to change the ball and they didn’t act outside the law. We accepted that,” he added. Shaharyar Khan told a press conference later Monday that they had lodged a protest to the governing body, the ICC, over the ball-tampering charge and forfeiture of the Test match. “The umpires didn’t even bother to ask our players what had happened…We know for a fact that no ball tampering took place. Several times the ball hit the concrete when (Kevin) Pietersen was batting. The ball was in a condition one would expect a ball used for 56 overs to be,” he stated. He also defended his team’s action to not come out immediately after tea to register their protest. “They didn’t come out because they were wronged. The decision to change the ball was pre-meditated.” Shaharyar also made it clear that the one-day series against England was not in any danger of not being played.