With flannelled fools and muddied oafs

Kipling wrote these lines denouncing the British public’s priorities in 1902. They could apply to India in 2012: “Then ye returned to your trinkets; then ye contented your souls With the flannelled fools at the wicket or the muddied oafs at the goals.

Kipling wrote these lines denouncing the British public’s priorities in 1902. They could apply to India in 2012: “Then ye returned to your trinkets; then ye contented your souls With the flannelled fools at the wicket or the muddied oafs at the goals.

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Given to strong delusion, wholly believing a lie, Ye saw that the land lay fenceless, and ye let the months go by…” Why did we let ourselves get distracted from Project India by bad religion, bad films and recently by some very bad cricket?

Because it’s not two-minute Top Ramen to clean up the centuries, so it was someone else’s dharma? But OCD-ing on spectator sports is surely for retirees who have earned the right to the rocking chair? I wish we’d watch less of cricket and other mind-destroying programmes that take away our energy and focus from Making India Happen. It made us inactive and sullen, like kids who surf too much.

But how can our life have dignity if our main buzz is to feed our face with post-WTO MNC snacks while we endlessly watch people throw, thwack and kick a ball or run around, run after, jump over and jump off everything that can be? Meanwhile the thieves are stealing our health, wealth and honour. It’s the new Opium War, abetted by the chomping blue billion. Anyone who protests is vilified as a jhola and admittedly, some jholas are impractical and/or self-righteous — like here? But at least they’re not watching cricket. They’re out there yelling and screaming to save Indians from becoming 19th century Chinese.

Renuka Narayanan writes on religion and culture