The Wasim Jafar episode is somewhat different from the usual case of discrimination in the name of religion, race, region, caste or tribe. This is simply because he is no more a player now. Such biasedness is common in sports/games and no country can claim that it has a fool-proof system to pick up players.
But this time the case is quite different. As a teenager, Wasim Jafar perhaps faced no difficulty in getting selected at the club level and subsequently, at the age of 22 got Test cap. He went on to become the highest run-scorer in Ranji Trophy for Vidharba. He scored five centuries, including a double ton in about eight years of cricket in which he played 31 Tests.
Till then it was a smooth sail for Jafar. He was then dropped and could never retain his place. May be due to cut-throat competition and emergence of a number of young and talented players.
After all Gautam Gambhir, now the BJP MP from East Delhi, has a complaint. He still accuses Mahindra Singh Dhoni for the abrupt end to his cricketing career when he, according to him, was at the prime of his career.
Jafar’s problem is that his religion, Islam, became an issue for the first time when he, at the age of 43, resigned from the post of head coach of Cricket Association of Uttarakhand on February 9.
In fact, when he had quit from the post it did not become any big national level news as Uttarakhand cricket team is not a big name. Of late the state is known more for producing wicket-keeper batsman Rishabh Pant than anything else.
It needs to be mentioned that Jafar on February 9 e-mailed his resignation as head coach of the team citing “interference and bias of selectors and secretary in the selection matters for non-deserving players.” It was no big news even in the sports pages of the newspapers and channels, who were more busy in highlighting the news of the First Test between India and England, which the latter won.
But everything changed a day later when Mahim Verma’s statement appeared in a Hindi daily Dainik Jagran, accusing Jafar of dividing the team with “mazhabi gatividhi” (religious activities), fighting with officials and using coercion to replace captain Kunal Chandela with fellow Muslim, Iqbal Abdullah.
The team manager Navneet Mishra was cited by the same newspaper as saying that ‘maulvis’ had turned up for Friday prayer during a training camp. Jagran made Mahim and Navneet’s version as front-page news.
On February 11 Jafar called the charges “lowly” and “sad”. It was chief selector Rizwan Shamshad and his panel who had put forward Iqbal’s name as captain. The Maulvi was called by Iqbal, Jafar clarified.
Jafar would not move Muslim players for practice on Friday afternoon. He told Iqbal Abdullah that if he wanted a Maulvi after training, he needed official permission.
According to the Indian Express, Navneet Mishra gave Iqbal permission, saying, “No problem, Iqbal, prayer and religion are most important.”
No doubt Jafar got the support of several cricketers who have played with him. They included Anil Kumble, Mohammad Kaif, etc. But unfortunately, the number is very limited.
The fact is that Jafar, who had coached Bangladesh team,, would get new assignment and soon everyone may forget this whole chain of incidents. But the more dangerous phenomenon is the use of religion to justify all the misdemeanour and malpractices. After all, Jafar is a well-known name in comparison to Mahim Verma. Jafar had quit because he did not find things suitable for himself. He did not cite any religious excuse to bid a good-bye.
It is Mahim Verma, who dragged the name of Jafar’s religion to defend himself. Had he not said so to the media a day later after Jafar’s resignation, he would not have faced any big storm. For a few days this development would have remained in the news in the local newspaper and regional channels and then it would have been all over.
By bringing in the name of religion, Mahim Verma and Navneet Mishra might have tried to defend themselves. But instead, they ended up with eggs all over their faces. Politically, they may be correct but the casualty was the game of cricket.
What went largely unnoticed is the fact that two more coaches of Uttarakhand had to quit in quick succession before Jafar. They were K P Bhaskar and Gursharan Singh.
Unlike Jafar’s post-retirement episode, players have during their career or after the retirement levelled charges of discrimination. Apart from Gautam Gambhir’s case, such allegations were levelled in the past by Indian hockey star Aslam Sher Khan, famous Pakistani leg-spinner Danish Kaneria and many others.
In Europe and the United States several Black athletes and footballers have often raised the issue of discrimination and biasedness even though they have very strong presence in sports They often complain of crowd behaviour too.
The most well-known case is of the then World Heavyweight Boxing Champion, Muhammad Ali Clay of the United States in late 1960s and early 1970s. Ali, who was from African-American origin, was originally Cassius Clay. As he embraced Islam in 1961 and announced to change his name in 1964, he had to undergo a lot of harassment in his own country, which always boasted about its liberal ideas and policies. In 1966 Ali was asked to go to Vietnam to fight a senseless war for capitalist America. When he refused, he was stripped of his title and sentenced to five years imprisonment.
However, he had to continue his legal battle for the next five years. As he was out of practice, he lost to Joe Frazer in 1971.
It is another thing that in 1974 he retained this title of World Champion by defeating George Foreman.
It is not that players are singled out for harassment simply because he or she is religious. Hashim Amla of South Africa and Moin Ali of England are devout Muslims yet they are respected and even allowed to offer namaz.
At the same time, one cannot forget the fact that while being a commentator former Australian cricketer-turned-commentator, now late, Dean Jones, yelled, “The terrorist gets another wicket” when Amla, who sports flowing beard, took a catch of Sri Lankan batsman Kumar Sangakkara in 2006. Jones later apologised but that was too little, too late.
A sort of storm erupted in Indian hockey when in the 1970s a leading figure in the selection committee was quoted by an English-language magazine as saying: “These Sardarjis have spoiled the game of hockey.”
What had happened was that Indian team lost several international matches to Australia and European teams. Those were the years when Indian and Pakistani teams used to dominate the game of hockey. As a sizeable number of Indian players were Sikhs, this gentleman found this way to express his disgust but that was not the era of Internet and information explosion.