Monthly Archives: March 2021

Sri Lanka’s Sanath Jayasuriya and Pakistan’s Shahid Afridi were two of the most destructive batsmen in the mid to late 1990s era. Both were at the peak of their form at the same time.

Jayasuriya broke the record for fastest 100 in ODIs [one-day internationals] in 48 balls against Pakistan in 1996 in Singapore. Afridi, on the other hand, broke that record against the Sri Lanka in the same year when he scored 100 off just 37 balls in Nairobi.

I remember having discussions in school at that time on what would happen if Jayasuriya and Afridi were in the same team and they opened the batting together. I would regularly note down my World XI team and would include both the players in it.

The dream of watching Jayasuriya and Afridi in the same team came true all of a sudden when a match between India and Rest of the World [ROW] was planned.

The match was organized on 30 December 1997 by Sathya Sai Baba at his model village in Puttaparthi. A stadium was specially created for this match in a short time. It’s perhaps the only cricket stadium that has big statues of various Gods like Hanuman, Shankar, Jesus and Buddha on the boundaries.

The purpose behind the match was to promote unity among the various nations of the world through spirituality. The stadium offered a perfect setting to achieve the goal. More so with school students taking out a rally with the flags of every country in the world.

The dignitaries who attended the match included the then Indian Prime Minister IK Gujral, former Indian cricketers Sunil Gavaskar and EAS Prasanna, former Pakistani cricketers Zaheer Abbas and Hanif Mohammad and former West Indian players Clive Lloyd and Alvin Kallicharran. Syed Kirmani, another former Indian cricketer, was the commentator.

The dignitaries seated (Photo source: Radiosai.org)

India was captained by Sachin Tendulkar and World XI by Arjuna Ranatunga. The latter consisted mostly of Sri Lankan and Pakistani players. The Indians came up with a full strength side despite it being an unofficial match. Apart from Tendulkar, they had the likes of Sourav Ganguly, Rahul Dravid, Anil Kumble, Ajay Jadeja, Venkatesh Prasad, Sunil Joshi etc.

India won the toss and opted to bat in the 45-over contest and made a big score of 289 for 4. Tendulkar was the star of the innings as he scored 88 not out, followed by Jadeja (77) and Dravid (62). I have a slight memory of few aggressive shots by Tendulkar and Dravid.

Then came the moment I was waiting for as Jayasuriya and Afridi came out to open. They started off decently but their opening partnership didn’t yield much as Afridi was dismissed soon. But Jayasuriya scored a quick 45, followed by Arjuna Ranatunga’s 67.

However, no other batsman showed any form as the World XI was bowled out for just 165 in just 26.2 overs. Prasad, Joshi and Sairaj Bahutule had bowling figures of 4-37, 3-24 and 3-16 respectively. India comfortably won by a heavy margin of 124 runs.

For complete details of the match, click HERE.

After defeating Jayasuriya and company — Indian team with the Unity Cup (Photo source: Radiosai.org)

Unfortunately, no video footage of this match is available anywhere on the internet. In fact, even a proper scorecard of the match isn’t available anywhere except a part of it here HERE.

Hopefully, someone might remember this match and try to find out any video after going through the article. The match was telecast by Doordarshan. They surely would have it in the archives.

Although it wasn’t a close contest by any means, at least the view of the beautiful stadium should be worth revisiting this match.

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Superstar’s Silence: Why Halla Bol is more relevant today

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To say that a film was ahead of its times has become a cliché. But there is no better way to describe Rajkumar Santoshi’s Ajay Devgn-starrer Halla Bol (2008). The film would have surely made more heads turn had it released in the current era.

Halla Bol traces the journey of Ashfaque Khan (Devgn). Hailing from a small town in India, he was named after the revolutionary Ashfaqulla Khan. Ashfaque dreams of becoming a film star. He joins a theatre group run by a reformed dacoit Sidhu (Pankaj Kapur) as a first step towards fulfilling his dream.

Sidhu specializes in using the medium of theatre to expose social evils and raise issues that are plaguing the society. Ashfaque wholeheartedly takes part in all such plays that aim to make a difference in the society, staying true to his name.

Meanwhile, Ashfaque’s efforts to get a break in movies pay off and he soon acquires the status of a star. He changes his name from Ashfaque Khan to Sameer Khan. But along with his name, he also changes as a person. Unlike Ashfaque, Sameer plainly refuses to take part in a play organized by Sidhu once for a social cause because this could hamper his star status, much to the shock and disappointment of the latter.

Not just that, the simple and innocent Ashfaque now becomes a womanizer and cheats his childhood love and wife (Vidya Balan) on numerous occasions.

Sameer’s biggest turning point arrives when he witnesses a murder at a party. He doesn’t testify against the culprits out of fear. But when his conscience doesn’t allow him to be at peace, he decides to carry out his duty as a responsible citizen by naming the killers to the police.

However, he receives serious threats since the perpetrators belong to the camp of the powerful and corrupt politician Ganpatrao Gaekwad (Darshan Jariwala). Raising voice against him would mean an end not only for his career but also his life.

Hence, the man known for raising his voice when he was a nobody becomes silent to all wrongdoings after becoming a superstar.

I was quite impressed with Hall Bol when it had released more than a decade ago. But when I look at it today, it excites me even more. It seems the film was tailor-made for the era we are currently living in.

The idea of a superstar not willing to raise his voice against an offence provided an interesting conflict back then. But today, it seems like straight out of reality. A lot has changed since last 6-7 years. Big stars are now super scared to share their opinion on any serious issue, leave alone raising their voice against a wrongdoing, like they used to before.

In fact, some stars are not even willing to speak up on the enormous rising prices of petrol. Interestingly, the same people were happy to share jokes on the same issue when the previous government was in power and when the price of fuel was much lower than what it is today.

Funnily, one star even deleted his tweets from 2012 when he had shared jokes on rising petrol prices. So that people stop questioning him as to why he is silent now.

Hall Bola shows Sameer go through a change of heart later on. He fights the evil forces all by himself [with timely help from Sidhu] to bring justice to the deceased. Of course, it would be laughable to even think of expecting this in reality. Halla Bol, after all, was a mainstream Hindi movie, so it had to end this way.

The extent of the fear of the authorities in today’s times was seen the most last month when famous celebrities shared scripted tweets in favour of the government after Rihanna spoke up on the issue of farmers’ protest.

Funnily, among the famous names who tweeted included the main lead of Halla Bol.

P.S: Halla Bol is available on Amazon Prime Video, Shemaroo Me and Voot.

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