Jono
Virat Kohli (c)
Ramachandra Guha: The strange silence of Gavaskar and Shastri | Opinion | Cricinfo Magazine | ESPN Cricinfo
Their silence during the elections of their parent association confirmed, for me, the pusillanimity of the two. The recent revelations that they are paid propagandists of the Board of Control for Cricket in India have confirmed, for many other fans, the lack of principle in Gavaskar and Shastri. They feel betrayed by the disclosure that commentators they trusted to give a fair and credible account of the game were under contract to speak in His Master's Voice alone.
...
Gavaskar has answered the charge that he is a spokesman for the board by claiming that his newspaper columns have sometimes been critical of its policies. However, in hundreds of hours of hearing Shastri and Gavaskar speak on television, I cannot recall them ever being critical in any way of the BCCI. Crucially, in both print and on air I have never heard either commentator ever do anything but praise the Indian Premier League in lavish terms. Neither has commented on the shady financial underpinnings of the league, neither has dared point out that the ownership of the Chennai Super Kings by the board's secretary is legally and morally indefensible
...
One would expect Gavaskar and Shastri, as active, influential, full-time commentators on the game, to make these connections between the board's obsession with the IPL and the poor performance of the Indian team in England. That they have stayed silent suggests that their commitment to cricket is not as dispassionate as it perhaps should be.
The cynic would say that these criticisms are beside the point, that Gavaskar and Shastri are merely doing a job. But in this fan, the sense of disappointment remains. Having watched Gavaskar and Shastri win and save Test matches for India, I ask: why must they be so blind to the ways in which the IPL is bad for Test cricket in India? Having watched them, time and again, help Mumbai defeat my own state, Karnataka, I wonder: why could they not support their former team-mate in the MCA elections against a cricket-illiterate politician?
Pretty huge attack.
Their silence during the elections of their parent association confirmed, for me, the pusillanimity of the two. The recent revelations that they are paid propagandists of the Board of Control for Cricket in India have confirmed, for many other fans, the lack of principle in Gavaskar and Shastri. They feel betrayed by the disclosure that commentators they trusted to give a fair and credible account of the game were under contract to speak in His Master's Voice alone.
...
Gavaskar has answered the charge that he is a spokesman for the board by claiming that his newspaper columns have sometimes been critical of its policies. However, in hundreds of hours of hearing Shastri and Gavaskar speak on television, I cannot recall them ever being critical in any way of the BCCI. Crucially, in both print and on air I have never heard either commentator ever do anything but praise the Indian Premier League in lavish terms. Neither has commented on the shady financial underpinnings of the league, neither has dared point out that the ownership of the Chennai Super Kings by the board's secretary is legally and morally indefensible
...
One would expect Gavaskar and Shastri, as active, influential, full-time commentators on the game, to make these connections between the board's obsession with the IPL and the poor performance of the Indian team in England. That they have stayed silent suggests that their commitment to cricket is not as dispassionate as it perhaps should be.
The cynic would say that these criticisms are beside the point, that Gavaskar and Shastri are merely doing a job. But in this fan, the sense of disappointment remains. Having watched Gavaskar and Shastri win and save Test matches for India, I ask: why must they be so blind to the ways in which the IPL is bad for Test cricket in India? Having watched them, time and again, help Mumbai defeat my own state, Karnataka, I wonder: why could they not support their former team-mate in the MCA elections against a cricket-illiterate politician?
Pretty huge attack.