Though supporting Pakistan for a cricket match is frowned upon in India, it is surprising for me to find few Pakistanis showing allegiance to India for the semi-finals against Australia in this World Cup. I was browsing through social media for the past two days and I found interesting facts to support my hypothesis. In one post, an Indian working in Middle East commented that he had seen Pakistanis supporting India when Pakistan is not playing. But he equally blamed Indians for not supporting Pakistan when India is not playing. He mentioned, “We Indians do support Sri Lanka or Bangladesh but not Pakistan.” He added that, most Pakistanis support India when their nation is not playing. It is really interesting for someone like me who had never interacted with any Pakistanis.
If you’re an active follower of cricket, you might know about Mohammad Bashir, a Pakistani who supports India when Pakistan is not playing. In fact, Dhoni used to arrange tickets for him.
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Here is a blogger from Pakistan supporting India after Pakistan lost to Australia. Follow her here
I have heard stories from School and College friends stating that Muslims in India in their locality used to burst crackers when Pakistan wins against India. I personally asked few of my Muslim friends which nation they would support. This question of me blew the fuse of many and they were angry at me for asking such a stupid question. Before jumping the gun and stamping me as an RSS agent, I am sure you’d have heard about the 2011 semi-finals between India and Pakistan when Srinagar was shut down on the day of encounter and fall of wickets on the Indian side was cheered by bursting crackers. May be, I should not have stereotyped and jumped to conclusions. You cannot blame me too. I have asked this question to few of my Tamil friends, “If the LTTE occupied area in Sri Lanka was announced as a separate country and if they had a cricket team, and if they played against India, which team would you support.”
I am sure, the answers I got were very surprising. I remember an article published by a Chinese magazine that said each state in India has a sub-level identity and a wider Indian level identity is missing in India and therefore each state can be disintegrated into separate nations. Though it is a fantasy for China to think that way, the answers to my question intrigued me. Even today, Tamils feel that the media is biased towards the state. Let me quote an example, a leading English daily mentioned, “Indian fishermen fishing near territorial waters of Pakistan got arrested by Pakistan” while when Sri Lankan navy arrest the fishermen from Rameshwaram, the same newspaper mentioned, “ Tamil fishermen arrested by Sri Lankan navy.” Why not Gujarati fishermen in the earlier case and why Tamil fishermen in the latter case? This post was doing rounds in the social media for a while.
May be this is the agenda of the Political masters to divide and rule to keep the powers to themselves. I am not sure how many who doesn’t know the language Tamil know this fact that the word “Nadu” in Tamil means country. So what Tamil Nadu means is Tamil Country. Seems like a larger political agenda. I am not trying to justify the answers my friends gave but I am trying to find answers for myself. Before writing this article I asked few friends why they did not support Pakistan in cricket matches when India is not playing. Pat came the reply, we hate them. When I probed them further, some said, it is because of religion. So I asked them, do you hate UAE too? They said NO. After talking to almost like twelve friends, the conclusion is, they export terrorism into India and have killed innocent civilians. They quoted Kargil and then Mumbai attacks and numerous bomb blasts that happened in India.
In 1999 test match between India and Pakistan, the Chennai crowd at Chinnaswamy stadium gave Pakistan a standing ovation when they won the match. Is that possible anymore? Why is it that the trend has changed and we don't even remember that such an event happened? So people in India hate Pakistan for its terror activities in Indian soil. What could be the reason for Pakistanis to support India in cricket matches when India is not playing? Do they also realize that the terror attacks in India are because of the terrorists who infiltrate from the Pakistani side? Or is it because the very few rational thinkers in Pakistan are the ones active in social media? Whether this was their opinion for long or things changed after Pakistan started imploding on its own due to internal crisis. Whatever it may be, it is a surprise for someone like me.
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