There’s a distinctly new class theory at work at the hockey World Cup in the capital. The tournament has brought to the fore a new kind of Rs 100 spectator—he (and she) is vastly different from his 100-bucks counterpart in cricket. Well-dressed, well-shod, distinctly middle and upper class. The hortatory cries, as well as the denunciations, are frequently in English, in the jargon of the educated young—“No. 6 sucks!” or “Can’t you run faster, idiot?”
These new hockey sprogs are politically correct and savvy—giving Pakistan a standing ovation or carrying banners saying ‘All Are Welcome—No Racism’ during the match against Australia. There are some famous faces in the crowd in the more elite stands, including those who dissect or illuminate complex social issues on television. Strangely enough, even though there are vacant seats in the cheapest stands, the humbler sections of the society comprise a minuscule percentage of the crowd.
Perhaps it’s because of the marketing world’s focus on the middle class, and its projection of sport as entertainment. You don’t play this (or that) sport, you don’t read about it, you don’t even understand it, but it matters not. You just go out and shout for your team, eat at the spiffy stalls just outside the ground. There’s the opportunity of singing the national anthem in a communal setting, hand upon heart—an exercise, reported a large number of people to Outlook, that raised goosebumps. Hockey is the new vent to a preening, nationalistic pride.
Former Indian captain Zafar Iqbal accepts that the class character of spectators has changed remarkably from the times he used to play in the 1980s. Hockey has lost its constituency of the poor. It is quite expensive to play—you need 22 hockey sticks, as opposed to one bat for 22 players, for instance—and the less advantaged have ceased playing it. In most open spaces, in schools and slums and streets, you see kids playing cricket; there are no great icons in hockey, no riches, and consequently no great urges of aspiration and dreams of social mobility.
The elite, he argues, are supporting the game because of their sense of altruism, their compulsive desire to play patrons or adopt a cause. “There’s a feeling that the players haven’t got their due,” says Iqbal, alluding to the strike the national team players had to resort to to get the fees dues to them for representing the country. “The people may not really follow hockey, they may not know much about the game. But the weather is nice in the evenings, the stadium is lovely and they’re having a good time,” he adds, admitting he’s delighted to find people returning to hockey in such big numbers, irrespective of background.
The absence of the less privileged is also by design—the marketing people aren’t really focused on them. Tickets can be bought from a website, some Union Bank of India branches, and outlets of Fast Trax restaurant chain and Cafe Coffee Day, hangouts of the elite. “The average hockey-watcher is used to buying tickets at the counter at the Shivaji Stadium,” says Novy Kapadia, academic and sports commentator. “There’s a clear class bias here. Cafe Coffee Day is for people who have money to spare, who work on their laptops inside the cafe. Those who can’t afford CCD won’t be comfortable going in for the tickets, they won’t want to be asked by waiters in English whether they want something.”
Shivendra Singh scores against Pakistan
Tight security and all the horror stories in the media about harassment of journalists created negative publicity for the World Cup. “That would have scared off a lot of people, who would have thought that if the influential media is treated in this way, they would be in for worse,” says Kapadia. But from D-Day onwards, the cops have proved to be refreshingly polite and the security procedures hassle-free. There has been no trouble in the stands, even during the volatile India-Pakistan match when a bunch of Pakistan supporters was engulfed by Indian fans. Sports minister M.S. Gill told Outlook, “That was a great positive, and the Pakistan team told me that though they lost, they lost to a better team before a fair crowd.”
But the minister admits there have been imperfections in marketing the tournament. He says he’d have advised the organisers to play a few matches in Chandigarh. “It’s almost a satellite of Delhi,” he says. “There were massive crowds last year at the Punjab Gold Cup, and they would have had 40,000 people for the World Cup games, and that would have given the sport a big boost.”
The crowd got behind India as, in the words of the gleeful announcer at the stadium, India “crushed” a nervous Pakistan 4-1. Two days later, though, the boot was on the other foot as Australia veritably crushed India 5-2, playing with what Jose Brasa, India’s chief coach, later admitted was a totally “different kind of speed”. That match elicited a different reaction. Some spectators walked out after the fifth Australian goal early in the second half, and many started shouting against the Indians. “Why are they staying behind, why can’t they go forward and score?” shouted many, oblivious of the fact that Australia are No. 2 and India No. 12 in the world. The crowd had come to see India win—a result that would have been akin to Bangladesh beating India in a cricket Test match.
“Many of the middle- and upper-middle class people would have come just because it’s a World Cup,” says P.S.M. Chandran, authority on sports medicine and former India hockey team doctor. “Many of them would have come even if it were a rugby world cup match! Many, of course, understand hockey, and the older ones among them would have memories of India ruling world hockey. The young, though, know India as only a straggler, they don’t know of the glory days. We need success and icons in hockey to expand its fan base.”
Kapadia laments that marketing firms are reducing sports events to entertainment and focusing on the elite which is just a viewing class, not a class that produces athletes. “Will they be back for the Nehru Hockey tournament?” Kapadia asks. “I don’t think so. Big events are the province of high-profile people to show themselves off. It’s better to focus on the people who would go to Nehru Hockey, who are used to going to the stadium and buying the tickets there. They are the people who truly support hockey.”
Perhaps that will happen in more auspicious times for sport. For now, the mere sight of long queues outside the venue of a hockey match, irrespective of its social class, is a reason to rejoice. For pulling in the masses, though, marketing firms and the organisers would need to realise that selling sport is not the same as creating sportsmen.
