Dear Editor,
Please allow me to respond to Mr Devanand Bhagwan’s letter, ‘We should not attempt to smother aspects of the ethnic mosaic’ (SN, January 15).
I have never seen the Indian or any other press refer to Mohamed Azahuraddin other than as an Indian cricketer or India’s Captain. India, of course, has had other Muslim cricketers and captains, including the 1st and 2nd Nawabs of Pataudi and Ghulam Ahmed with much the same treatment in public. There is not a little irony in this, since India appears to be one of the most ethnic, religious and colour conscious communities in the world today. One could say as much about the United Kingdom with its historic class and colour hierarchies, yet I have never seen a reference to England’s captain Nasir Hussain prefixed by his Muslim identity. The last reference I saw of him reads “Nasir Hussian OBE, former English cricketer … captained England from 1999 to 2003”. The same can be said of Hashim Amla or Mooen Ali. And while it is true that the latter’s facial hair bespeaks of something else as well, the definitive moment of their identity as cricketers is denoted by the crest on the caps they wear – English, South African, Indian, West Indian, etc. Capping at the national/international level is a significant symbolic moment for all players. They are being inducted into the paternity/fraternity of their nation. And however maligned and eviscerated the nation may be, it is the nation’s cap, however uneasily it sits on their individual heads. Refuse it and you don’t belong. A soldier’s obligation to duty! The pre-eminence of the nation in the world of belonging. There isn’t another cricket league other than the ICC and the only membership there is, is a national one.
Now for the second question: Cricket was and continues to be an instrument of colonial/imperial modernity with clearly defined boundaries of induction and belonging. And here was the rub. After the genocidal moment of colonial conquest European countries, Spain, Portugal, France, Holland and England, sought to transform these New World societies into sites for the production of tropical commodities – tobacco, sugar, coffee, cotton, etc. They did so, however, on grounds that were both morally and materially possible as indicated by the celebrated debate between Sepulveda and Las Casas. And here, as Eric Williams showed, the Spanish fandango was no match for the English waltz – moral turpitude could be made to join any Argentinian tango when sufficiently dazed by the scent of English leather. Expectedly, New World societies gave old Europe some interesting new models in the mass produced plantation goods in which they came to specialize. Chief among these were the regimes of labour that were brought to service them, indicated by the shifting patterns of ethnic cohorts that formed the core of these regimes – Indigenous, African, Chinese, Indian, even some Europeans in the persons of Irish and Portuguese servants.
When, therefore, the English began to think of these communities as sustainable units, once the sugar regimes began to unravel under the weight of abolition and English free trade, it was the ethnic cohorts from the different labour regimes that now had to be enjoined to participate in the civilising mission. And these, as we know only too well, had already been socialized as separate ethnic communities – industrial, vocational, religious, rural/urban, educational, etc. Recruitment to the mission was, therefore and by definition, an ethnic game, guided by the principles of English modernity. Participation, belonging and legitimacy were then increasingly extended as the attributes were acquired, reproduced and spread. Key to the process of course was the emergence of ethnic leadership as the medium through which this would now occur. By the time our nationalist sentiments begin to emerge, ethnic organisations had already come to dominate. Enter Jagan and the PPP – decidedly modernist and Marxist – and a source of much consternation to both Brahamanic orthodoxy and the emerging middle classes. Not to worry, a split in the party, British efforts and the 1957 election results sealed the deal. The party would continue to wear its ‘fig leaf’ as both working class and multi-racial while turning itself into an electoral machine with a solid, majoritarian vote bank.
After that anything was allowed to play out, including opposing independence among sections of the party faithful after loss of the elections in 1964. That is only one step removed from ‘supporting’ other teams when they came to play the West Indies. Where is the effort to reject both reactions, because both are wrong; the ones that deny the right to East Indians to participate, fully and equally, and the other that encourages apostasy? Is the East Indian experience of being Guyanese so shallow and thin that at the first sight of trouble it drops the baton and bolts in the opposite direction?
Third and finally, here is what happens when East Indians are allowed the full and complete play of their autonomy under conditions of a post-colonial modernity. About three years ago the Berbice Cricket Board went to the Back Centre (Skeldon Estate) and formed an association called the Upper Corentyne Cricket Association. It was promised there and then that this was an interim body. Unfortunately, interim has now acquired a permanence and solidity that is not likely to be dislodged – soon. What is more important though, is that much if not all the cricket in the area has come to acquire a certain recognisible character ‒ indolence: Nothing is expected and nothing of significance delivered. There are few if any official umpires at the matches – better understood as ‘lash ball’, where young men (4-6 teams at any one time) come to perform – excessive and loud music, the latest cars on the market, and, of course, excessive alcohol. Oh, last point, during the elections last year the UCCA was transformed into a vote bank for the then ruling party and sponsored at least one ‘tournament’ to raise funds for the party’s political campaign.
Yours faithfully,
Rishee Thakur
