Opinion What’s wrong with life-sized?

Speaking at the Sir Donald Bradman Oration in Canberra,Rahul Dravid,one of the wiser heads of Indian cricket,stated: “The caricature often made of Indian cricket and its cricketers in the rest of the world is that we are pampered superstars. Overpaid,underworked,treated like a cross between royalty and rock stars. Yes,the Indian team has an enormous,emotional following…” He then he went to to defend his brethren but the truth is that Dravid is perhaps the only cricket star who stays humble,professional and low-key. The rest revel in their stardom and the riches that come with it. Even a newcomer like Virat Kohli is arrogant enough to make an obscene gesture to fans on the field of play,uncaring of the camera trained on him. There has been much commentary about the money that our players now earn,and how it can cloud perspective and commitment. Captain M.S. Dhoni,now facing the most criticism he has in his career,earns around Rs 10 crore a year in endorsements and as captain of an IPL team. Can his seeming indifference to a disaster like the current series be attributed to his financial stability and the fact that there will still be enough hero-worshippers even after the tour is over? It didn’t take very long for fans and the hysteria-inducing electronic media to put the disastrous England tour behind them and start to predict when Tendulkar would get his 100th international century.

The relevant question is whether our culture somehow intensifies this idol worship. Every day,Indians will stop at wayside shrines to many,many divinities,including animals and rodents,to ask for blessings. Of course,Hindu scriptures give no licence to idol worship,quite the opposite — there is a verse in the Vedas that says: “Those who worship visible things born of the Prakriti,such as the earth,trees,bodies (human and the like) in place of God are enveloped in still greater darkness,in other words,they are extremely foolish,fall into an awful hell of pain and sorrow.” Vivekananda is more charitable,calling idolatry “the attempt of undeveloped minds to grasp high spiritual truths.”

Whether or not it is rooted in religion,we tend to worship our idols,ignoring their imperfections. Writer Mark Driscoll warns of the dangers of misplaced worship,because icons “invariably disappoint. They aren’t perfect. They aren’t continually faithful. They don’t endure forever.” Perhaps part of the problem is that we feel compelled to worship what everybody else does,whether it is cricketers,film stars,celebrities,fashion icons or even politicians. In an age of over-the-top marketing and consumerism,everybody becomes a brand. There’s a verse in the Gita that seems to say it all: “Those whose intelligence has been stolen by material desires,surrender unto demigods and follow the particular rules and regulations of worship according to their own natures.” Our nature,sadly,seems to demand an idol we can revere,careful to avert our eyes from the feet of clay.

dilip.bobb@expressindia.com