Summers in India are hot and sticky affairs. Even the most developed of cities are at the mercy of the searing heat and their electricity boards. It is no surprise that power and electricity forms an integral part of many manifestos in election campaigns. In the year of 2012, the suburbs of Kolkata received, on an average, upto 10 hours of powercut daily. Sometimes even 16 hours. It was then that the Kolkata electricity board received a queer request - that the outage be restricted to the first half of the day.
IPL - RESHAPING INDIA'S SUMMER SINCE 2008
The Summers of Change
For ten years now, IPL has reshaped Indian summers and as a new decade beckons, the mega tournament promises so much more © BCCI
It was a humble plea from a Knight Riders supporter for an uninterrupted TV viewing experience of the league. That he was willing to sweat it out in sultry Kolkata mornings in exchange for three hours of late-evening entertainment was indicative of the new wave of T20 hysteria that was blowing across the length and breadth of the country.
About 2000 kilometres down south, a cab driver in Bengaluru had an intriguing tale to share. He tells the story of three techies who he used to ferry across the congested IT corridors of the city. His daily customers had mysteriously opted to work from home in the months of April and May, so as to sit together and break down the patterns of play in the league that could aide their betting endeavours.
It is quite ironic that in the summer of 2007, India's erstwhile coach John Wright gave a very nuanced understanding of the pressures of being an Indian cricketer and the inability of the first-class system to equip players to make the transition to the highest level. While the traditional first-class system offers lessons in discipline, team ethic and other fundamental characteristics, it offers nothing to prepare a player for the media and fan scrutiny, the invasion of privacy and the constant emotional upheavals that are all part of a day's work for an India cricketer. Ironically again, the title of Wright's book 'Indian Summers' came as a premonition of the giant step that Indian cricket was to take just 12 months from then.
Summers have never been the same since. For even those who were familiar with the great tamasha that can be Indian cricket, the sight of a laser show and a peculiar unveiling of cricketers on a podium at the Chinnaswamy stadium in Bengaluru brought apprehension and mystique in equal proportion. Suddenly, the my-city-versus-yours became a cricketing debate across several water-coolers in India. And then, somehow, ten seasons went by in a decade, redefining what April and May meant to India, and consequentially world cricket.
Such has been the impact of IPL that even Tendulkar - the pillar or Indian cricket - decided to release his biopic after the tournament last year. ©
The apprehensions took some time to die down, but eventually
