“Der ist no God
Der ist onlie de polees!”
From Thus Spake Nietzsche by Bachchoo
There is no evidence that the intrusion of capitalism and the gladiatorial cricket leagues breathed expertise into the Indian game. Of course, they generated crores of rupees, encouraged the worst kind of cheating in sport, facilitated a hundred gambling scams of mind-boggling ingenuity, made some corrupt fraudsters and some “straight” investors (Really? — Ed.) incredibly rich and raised a catalogue of objections from cricket purists who accused the Indian Premier League etc, of cheapening and ruining the game. Intrigued by the complexity of the gambling scams and wanting them explained — not for the purposes of imitating them as I am not in any sense a tempter of fate — not knowing very much about the prowess of the international players whose names are bandied about in this context and not being a follower of the game on TV, I have to be classified as neutral. I thought I understood, in some vague sense, the hysteria of the girls who shouted and screamed themselves hoarse at the live appearances of the Beatles or the Rolling Stones: They sang songs of love and subliminal sex and cast emotional spells with their melodies. Why women of a similar age and Indian background would throw modesty to the winds and display such passion and hysteria for some guy hitting a ball with a wooden bat, I never understood.
As I said I am not a gambling man and must confess have only bought a lottery ticket once in my life and that when I had a pound spare after investing a tenner in a good bottle of whatever. When John Major, the straight-laced British Prime Minister who followed Margaret Thatcher and preceded Tony Blair, introduced the National Lottery, I joined the puritans in looking down my nose at it. I am not entirely clear about the rules, but it entails choosing six numbers from between one and 49. If, after the twice-weekly draw, which is televised, in which a machine with spinning balls, each painted with one of the numbers, picks them out randomly, you have chosen all six correctly, you win a vast jackpot of millions of pounds. The odds on getting all six right, I am told, go into one against billions. When it was initiated we dubbed it “a tax on fools”. But now I must admit the country has to be convinced that this tax has done some good. A population that pays tax has to have, as the old democratic dictum goes, representation. The representatives then determine on what the money raised through tax should be spent.
This British tax on fools, raising millions, apart from the fraction that is dispensed on prize money, is spent not by the elected representatives of the British people, but by an appointed trust. The National Lottery is owned by itself, has no shareholders and no individuals, apart from the winners, profit from its gains. No, the money all goes to charities one of which, UK Sport, is a fund for the promotion of sport in Britain. It targeted £350 million on supporting participants in the Rio Olympics and Paralympics. The nation, including the Queen and Theresa May, the Prime Minister, congratulated the gambling-funded contingent from the UK (Team GB) for winning more medals than ever before. That wasn’t just a numerical increase on their last score. Part of the triumph is that Britain’s tally of medals was second only to that of the US and higher than that of China who were beaten into third place.
The National Lottery has no say in how the money it generates and gives away is distributed or used to promote sport. John Major, when he initiated the lottery, specified that some of its gains should go to the promotion of sport. The National Lottery gives a lump sum to UK Sport which gives a proportion of it to regional sporting bodies and then specifically targets those Olympic and Paralympic events in which UK athletes have a sporting chance. They then choose the potential champions they will fund and pay for their coaching and in many cases give them grants to live on while they train. Targeting specific sports, results in Britain winning in some of the more obscure events. That’s not to say that Dressage, the events involving running, swimming and canoeing, individually through rapids or as a pair in a straight race, cycling, particular gymnastics or the triathlon require less skill and training than any more famous sport. But these were targeted by the experts and the strategy of concentration paid off.
The triumph over China, which may not be the wisest thing to crow over, as the question of Chinese pride in their place in the world may very well be closely tied to their inclination to invest billions in several schemes that the former Chancellor George Osborne was in the process of negotiating. China and Russia have centralised access to their sportsmen and women. So much so that Russian ministers get involved in assisting athletes to cheat the doping tests on a national scale. China and Russia will undoubtedly deploy more state effort and funding to ensure that they do better at the Japanese Olympics four years hence. India’s two medals in Rio is something, but for a country that regularly boasts about its productivity increases, its strong economy and its cultural superiority, isn’t it time we won some more Olympic medals? India’s political structure doesn’t allow it to follow the sort of strategic effort towards Games that the more centralised nations can deploy. There is no doubt that the national consciousness favours cricket to other games, though hockey and kabbadi do make their own running. Is there no chance that the present government, whatever its moral stance on alcohol consumption and gambling, can follow Britain’s example and initiate a Rs 10- or even a Rs 5-a-ticket national lottery and conscientiously target the proceeds at sports other than cricket?
