Cricket: From money making to a new kind of slavery

By Dr. Surendra Singh Pokharna

World cup of Cricket is beginning on February 19 and will continue till April 2, 2011 for a month and half. In our country this has become a popular game and has now  become a National game or so and has virtually replaced Hockey which was once a National game. Behind this popularity lies a  number of   phenomena which are important to understand. Similarly there are many factors which we should understand that  will bring  changes in our life and in future generations. This article attempts to analyze various phenomena connected with cricket and attempt to explore their future implications in different  ways on the society and future of the youths. It appears that methodology of systems sciences can be used for better understanding of this game and various interconnected topics. 

The term systems science or systems analysis is commonly used to study complex systems which have more than two or three interconnected factors related with a major topic. The interconnectedness is so strong that various parts of the main system  cannot be studied in isolation. Also the connected parts are such that  each part affects others parts continuously and there are strong feedback relations among them. That is there is continuous  communication and exchange of information among various parts of the system. Some of the topics to be covered in this article are: How cricket has become popular through media and MNCs, why TV is the most powerful media for advertising, how urge of making money has brought other media agencies, politicians and businessmen into this game,   resulting into  a self sustaining  powerful system. Also we wish to explore some other factors  like how cricket has destroyed other games, how cricket has made the modern youths lethargic, dull and inactive;  how cricket has helped in popularizing English and English traditions, how the health of the youths will be affected in the  long run,  stress caused due to  frequent interruption of advertisement in the otherwise “live telecast” and many other factors. It appears that methodology of system sciences can provide new insight into the mechanism of popularity of this game and can provide  clues to both good and bad impacts in short and long term of this game.

It will be interesting to know how it has become popular game and how it has brought about changes in various fields. If we analyze the evolution of cricket in the country in last 20-30 years that is after arrival of TV, we find that TV has played an extremely important role in making cricket  popular. However, it is not TV alone, which has made it popular. Actually after liberalization of economy in 1991, arrival of MNCs in country, has helped in making this game very popular. As will be explained below, cricket is the most powerful game for   advertisement of  products of companies. Hence lot of money was pumped into it by businessmen both from India and outside.  But, the true potential of cricket to sell one’s products was realized by MNC’s first and then by Indian businessmen. The real breakthrough could be attributed to the use of cricket telecast to sell soft drinks.  As cost of chemical soft drinks is very low their manufacturers have lot of money to advertise the soft drinks and they have used it intelligently.

It is quite well known  that cricket is a very powerful media for advertisers because crores and crores of people  can see the game live. However,  there is a need to go into some detail to understand it further. Actually there are two major factors in this context. The first is that this is one of the game which lasts not just for one day but even for five days and even months together. And many people are watching them for all days and for full days and so they will be watching  ads also several  times. This is in contrast to other games which are played for just one hour  or few hours like Football, Volleyball, Basket ball, Swimming competitions, Running races or Shooting competitions etc. Hence it is not possible to show advertisements for long times in these games. However, this is not the total story. The real characteristic of cricket is that there is a time gap between two consecutive balls, which can vary from few seconds to almost a minute or so.  It is this time gap which is used by advertisers to show their products. Thus in a one day game of 50  overs. Each team plays 50 overs that is six hundred (600) balls are thrown in one day.  Hence the total number of intervals (slots) available to show advertisement is nearly equal to five hundred ninety nine (599). If these  intervals are shared by say five companies then  on the average each company can show their ads almost 100 times just in one day, assuming that only one ad is shown in each interval.  All other  media (say print media)  do not have this capacity, because their ads will be seen only once or twice.  Also even in TV, unless a programme continues for whole day and for many days,  only then  ads can be viewed several times. The way soft drinks  have entered into mind of crores of Indians can be easily attributed to this process. Of course now many Indian companies  are also entering into this fray. 

Through this nexus of media, industrialists, politicians and businessmen, new cricket heroes are created and then products are advertised through them both “Online through live telecast themselves“ and Offline through other media in non playing time. ”

Once money starts  pouring into cricket, several agencies comes into picture. First print and electronic media are used to communicate and create an atmosphere as if cricket is the only game in the country. They will show past records, big photographs and minutest details of the game, scoreboards and even lot of personal details so as to produce a real havva of cricket. As almost one lakh  of people see the game live on ground. The money comes from this, but this is peanut. Actual  money comes  through ads shown in TV during the live telecast. The money earn in second case is much more than the first. As  this is a powerful media for advertisers, their sales go up due to very successful  advertisements and so  the industrialist and businessmen earn lot of money. Looking at so much money, many other parties also jump into the fray, which includes politicians and bookies. The worst part of the story is that even Government  controlled Doordarshan has many times shown cricket for full day and for several days, by dropping  many crucial programs of importance for the county and even the time of news were  being changed. Is it justified for a country like India ? Essentially it has become a nexus between big industries, media and politicians. However, except for money they do not look at anything else.

As is well known, advertisements are shown after each ball, it means telecast of actual match is frequently interrupted say 599 times in one day match of 50 overs. It will be interesting to investigate whether the persons watching such interrupted matches have a large amount  of stress as compared to a live telecast without such interruptions. There is a need to have a research by  a team of psychologists and social scientists.

A very important impact of cricket telecast is that it is being played for several hours or even days compared to other games which are of much shorter durations. Hence cricket players on the average do not require much stamina or energy at a given time.  Hence we find that most of the cricket players have less physique compared to say players of Football or Basketball or racers etc.   However, the worst part is yet to come.  As live telecast is seen by crores of people for hours and days together.  Persons watching these live telecast  virtually do not require any energy or  stamina. Only their eyes move on the TV screen and not even  the body at all. Even if some are motivated to play cricket after watching some matches, their physique can never compare to those of Football players. The situation of those who are just watching only is still worst because their bodies are not at all used. Hence nothing surprising that they may  be weak, inactive and passive. Also impact of cricket is so much so that people do not play other games in the country at the scale which is required for a country of our size.  So what will happen to the health of these youths who are just watching telecast or playing cricket.  Will they not become weak and lethargic, dull and inactive ?? If we look at the modern youths deeply involved in cricket , this observation seems to be true and can be validated. A set of scientific experiments can be planned to explore this topic  further. This is just an example of psycho-physiological feedback.

Everybody knows that these days, 37^th National games are also being played in Ranchi (Chhatisgarah) but its reporting in media is just insignificant. Government is also not paying sufficient attention to these games. Actually National TV channels should give full time televised broadcasts, but it is not there at all. What could have been a backbone of Indian sports and a forerunner for the next Olympics has been reduced to a non entity. The long term of impact of this game is very horrified. For a country of one hundred and ten crores, there will be heroes only in cricket and very few in other games. Hence it will badly affect our medal rally in coming Olympic games and other international games. The future generation will be very weak and dull. Many good sportsman who have highly developed skills in other games are deprived of honors and/or respect in the society. Hence  there is only skill development of cricket everywhere in the country. Do such mono skill development practices in sports are good for future of the youths because only  eleven players can play in the National team  ??

Cricket has done another damage to the society that is in popularizing the English language as most of the cricket players speak only English and follows  English traditions and slangs etc. It is another type of slavery .

Some people say that cricket brings about National integration. Was there no National integration when Hockey was a National game. Actually any game can bring about National integration.  The above analysis actually show that too much emphasis on cricket is brining disaster to this country in short term as all other sports are virtually forgotten and in the long run it is making our youths weak, lethargic and dull. The future generation may  therefore have many diseases and other health related problems.

As MNCs and big industrial houses who are using cricket as a media to sell their products are all having  big businessmen with large amount of resources    with huge  infrastructure and network of agents quite widely distributed. Hence they are all running monopolistic businesses. Therefore it is virtually impossible  for small businessmen to participate in this type of advertising. In the long run the businessmen of unorganized sector will be in deep trouble. Hence this is very much against Gandhian Economics which talks of development of all and opportunities for all and is badly required for our country where population is biggest asset. 

Till quite recently cricket was used to be considered as a Gentlemen game, but in recent years, all dirty things have entered into it like too much involvement of uncounted money, match fixing, role of satta and  bookies and making the people only watch the game, thereby making the people dull, lethargic and inactive. In addition, now players are saleable commodity and they are auctions like slaves in Europe in 16 century.   So has cricket  become a DirtyMen’s game from a Gentlemen game ?

If we combine the effect of all the above factors, it appears that modern cricket and the associated systems are taking us to a new kind of slavery in a very organized and an intelligent way, may be even without our knowledge. It is not we Indians alone,  who are the real sufferers but almost all people of the countries who were once slaves of Britishers and are now playing this game are moving towards this feeling of slavery of a new kind, more refined and obtained in a modernized way using modern  technologies, plans and strategies of the modern time. No weapons, no arms or no ammunitions are used and target is achieved. ??

As the system of cricket and associated sub systems is a new phenomenon in the country and is strongly affecting the society, hence it is suggested to plan some scientific experiments to validate some of the hypotheses mentioned above. Three specific studies will be (i) to verify that the process of telecasting cricket with constant interruptions by advertisements causes stress in the minds of regular watchers, (ii) the relative strength, stamina, and power of players of Football, Volleyball, Basketball, Kabbadi is higher than those of cricket players, (iii) Too much commercialization of cricket is affecting other games in the country. Some multidisciplinary teams are required to study these ideas in few universities.

1. Do not see the live telecasts  of these matches and request your friends and relatives also to do the same.
2. Start playing other games like Football Volleyball, Basketball, Carrom, Chess, Kabbadi, Kho kho  and several others which can be finished in an hour or so. At least encourage your children to play other games also.
3. Avoid reading news about these matches in newspapers.
4. Ask the media through sending letters, SMS, phones and emails, why are they not covering events of National games also. (Is it because they are not getting money from them or are not getting five star treatment from the organizers of  these games or some other reason ?)
5.  Ask the Government (through RTI) to make it public as to how much media has earned from covering world cup matches through articles, big reports, large photographs, space selling in TV and papers etc.
6. Also request Government to have a censor board (like film censor boards) to make rules and guidelines  for media to give sufficient coverage to National Games and many other such events also. Otherwise in the name of Freedom of Speech, they will   only cover  those events from where funds are easily obtained, which has nothing to do with Freedom of speech, it is rather freedom to earn by hook or by crook.