Don146;t play games with cricket

The more people-to-people contact there is, the more there is an awareness that continued hostility is counter-productive. Since both Pakistan and India are nuclear powers, a war between them must be ruled out .

But it is to the impending cricket tour by India that I must turn. As a cricket person, I look forward to it as will a billion or more people. It is a tour that is good for cricket, but will it create goodwill of a lasting kind?

My thoughts go back to 1955 when India undertook its first ever tour of Pakistan. I have reason to have fond memories because I made my debut as a cricket commentator.

I remember the test match at Lahore. In some absent-minded act of statesmanship, it was decided to open the Wagah border to enable Indian cricket fans to come to Lahore and watch the test match.

And they came in droves. As I recall there was a special enclosure for them and they had been given the freedom of the city. The people of Lahore welcomed them with open arms. A large number of these Indian cricket fans were Sikhs and they were easily identified. They rode on tongas on the Mall and the Lahoris cheered them, they went to restaurants and shops and the owners refused to accept payment.

There was a blind Sikh who just wandered about the streets. Lahore, he had said, was a homecoming for him and he just wanted to breathe its air and take in the smells.

It was an incredible sight and one felt the wounds of the Partition riots had been healed. But the goodwill was perishable. It needed some sustained follow-up, which was not forthcoming. Soon we were back to glowering at each other.

I have been back to India many times and I have been received by much kindness and affection. Since we look the same, there was no way of identifying me as some foreigner. One was able to walk about the streets anonymously, as it were.

Some tours were happier than others but that depended largely on one8217;s own frame of mind. Because it was best not to get into any political arguments, such arguments I had with the hosts were confined to cricket and to some bad umpiring decisions. The crowds at the cricket matches were understandably partisan and, except possibly at Kanpur or Delhi, they were not nasty. But one felt that it was always safe.

By suspending cricket links, the BJP government was not the first Indian government to do so. No political purpose was served, in fact, it seemed a way of punishing one8217;s own people.

Pakistan8217;s response was not tit for tat retaliation, as is generally the norm, but to continue to maintain that it would welcome resumption of sports ties.

The Indian Under-19 team, currently in Pakistan, was given a warm welcome on its arrival at Karachi. It must have made some impression on the young minds. The CBMs need to be directed at the young. The older generations carry too much baggage, too many memories.

But sooner or later the two countries will have to address the core problems behind what is turning out to be some historical blood-feud. In international relations, there may be no permanent friends. But there is no immutable law that says there have to be permanent enemies.

The Dawn