It's simply not cricket

Politicians have their own playing field and it?s called politics. When they decide to step out of its ambit, but they belie an unwanted arrogance.

Politicians have their own playing field and it’s called politics. When they decide to step out of its ambit, not only are they meddling in affairs they have no business to meddle in, but they belie an unwanted arrogance. West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee seems to have jumped off the rails and gatecrashed into an arena that is none of his business: cricket administration.

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The Chief Minister’s rant against Jagmohan Dalmiya, the victor in the Cricket Association of Bengal elections, defies sense. What makes his statements against Mr Dalmiya ludicrous — and offensive — is their moral overtones. So Mr Bhattacharjee doesn’t care for Mr Dalmiya. He is, like all citizens, entitled to his opinion. But as a Chief Minister, he is obliged to keep this opinion to himself. Instead, he went on to describe Mr Dalmiya’s electoral win as an example of “an evil power vanquishing the power of good”. It was bad enough that the CM had openly spoken out against the national cricket selection board’s decision to drop Sourav Ganguly, thereby exposing unfortunate parochialism in a man of his position. But his latest churlish outburst has exasperated even his well-wishers.

One hopes that the bhadralok image that Mr Bhattacharjee has (rightfully) acquired as a politician hasn’t gone to his head. As a politician, his territory is restricted to politics — not expanding to the issuing of moral certificates of who’s ‘good’ and who’s ‘evil’ in a sports body. Mr Dalmiya, for all the needling, and the insults, has shown his bhadralok-ness by not reacting to the CM’s outburst. Maybe there is something that the terribly good Chief Minister can learn from that.