Kartikey Sehgal

An ill man doesn’t want a temptress around him and he may turn down an offer to go out with two pretty women. He would want a woman to take care of him; someone who can comfort him in his ill health. Not all temptresses are known to be nurturing.

So an insecure man would want to marry a non-temptress. And the societally defined sexy woman would wonder what went wrong in her relationship.

When a man is ill, he would be less inclined to impress any woman. His body would want him to concentrate on his health. He wouldn’t be affected by beauty and may cancel the evening plans. Unless it is an all important date. He may attend to that date despite his health but it’ll be one minus for any long term plans with the woman.

Women cheer for a man playing a sport and gasp when he is injured. This man recuperates and the women cheer for another sportsman. If, during this time, a woman looks up the sportsman and wishes him well, then she has a better chance of forming a long term relationship with the sportsman.  Nurses have always been popular with men.

If a woman greet the sportsman only when he is healthy and back on the field, then she should expect a short term relationship. The nurse will hold his appeal and he may compare the woman to the nurse while making any long term relationship plans.

Kartikey Sehgal

Part one can be read here: Cricket and the Indian Woman–Part One
 

I have written about women who don’t know cricket but talk about it and about women who know that their interest in the sport is actually their interest in men. I shall now write about their social position in the context of the sport. Surely, they are not equals to men.

There are women who don’t like the sport and they don’t feign interest in the sport. They don’t buy tickets to go to cricket stadiums or spend hours watching live telecasts. Then there are women whose interest is solely sexual. What bonds both the types is the subservient position that this sport has given them. Globalisation and relaxation of morals has exposed several cricketing countries to India’s sexual insecurity and her attitudes towards women.

And Indian women don’t seem to mind if they know about their stature.

They are relegated to looking pretty on television, talking about male adrenaline and asking the male ‘experts’ questions about playing techniques; the women are not experts themselves.

Women who can talk about cricket (Anjum Chopra, prolific) are not media darlings like the spaghetti and noodle strap-wallas. They are not asked to promote cricketing events; at least not in the same stead as the models in mini dresses. So along with fairness cream ads and ‘item-numbers’ in movies, cricket reinforces stereotyping of women. The social position of women as aides to men is redefined every time the woman is seen as doing nothing greater than gushing over cricketers.

Last year, foreign women were brought to India to work as cheerleaders in the IPL tournament. Indian women are generally not seen as promiscuous unlike foreign women. So they were not approached to wear tiny clothes and dance every time a batsman hit a ‘sixer’.

Foreign cheerleaders (bottom) are doctors, lawyers and even students who have to earn their education and livelihood. Their bodies are supple and dances are sexy. They are not seen as scandalous in their countries. Indian cheerleaders (top) are untidy imitations grappling with fear of a conservative society.

And then the fairness cream ads have ensured that men salivate over white skin and women aimlessly apply loads of cosmetics on their skin. So, Indian women were sidelined in favour of the foreigners. The cheerleading act was criticised but men drove in large numbers to watch the dancing girls or stayed glued to the television sets waiting for the camera to show them semi-naked bodies. On one hand the white girls were being criticized and on the other hand men were whistling with joy.

The cheerleaders from foreign countries are much more honourable than the Indian women in context of the sport.

They are lawyers, nurses, sportswomen and even students who have to earn money to make it through college. They wear the tiniest dresses to excite the men and bring in more crowds. No Indian women can imitate them or take on their role without some scandal and societal problems.

The ‘white’ cheerleaders are equal to men in the sense that they can openly admit that they see sport (any sport) for the handsome men. Many Indian women would be considered shameful for expressing their sexual nature and most women in rural India would accept their desires in private or only in comfortable male company.

In addition, women in India are exposed to images of foreign women thronging football stadiums and enjoying themselves. In India, it is nearly impossible for them to enter the stadium if it is packed with men; most of them fear sexual assault.

Unlike the women in Europe who can go to stadiums with lesser fear of being attacked by men and who can wear the clothes of their liking, women in India have to take on the mantle of respect and conservatism. Men are the shouters, the aggressors; women have to be quiet and cheer or stand and clap but not as much as the man.

Not possible in Indian stadiums: It is not safe for women in India to attend packed cricket stadiums without fear of sexual assault

This may sound as an example of misogyny. If so, then women don’t seem to mind it. Actresses profess their admiration for cricketers but the journalists never ask them any tough questions. It is understood that women’s knowledge about cricket is limited and they are not to be expected to observe the sport closely.

Women are thus an accessory; they are an ornament to decorate the sport and provide it with glamour; attract men who don’t like the sport and serve as a tool to a sex starved male population. In essence, they are bought as a commodity through good money and sold as unintelligent temptresses, thereby re-enforcing the decisions of Indian men to discount the intellect of women.   

As long as the woman understands that she is masquerading as a cricket lover and walking the ramp with cricketers solely for money, there is little problem for her psyche.

Not quite 'homely': Former Indian captain Anjum Chopra will play her fourth successive World Cup this year. She is also a panelist on a cricket discussion show.

The problem here lies in the mindset of men who look at these women as show-pieces and don’t see that she is simply performing to earn money. The image of women as ‘cricket trophies’ is problematic for them in the male-dominated Indian society. It may not be a major problem for the woman if she is aware of her role in the sport and accepts it with the understanding that she has talents beyond serving as a temptress. The woman should be able to maintain her self outside the glamour of her job.

There is something for us to admire in the cricketer crazy women who watch the sport for the men alone and don’t pretend any affection for the sport. Once again, this is healthy because the woman is in control of her mind and desires. It is the woman who does not understand the gamut of their desires and the lies of advertisements that needs to be watchful.

I would like to end with a stark example of cricket consumerism that involves the nation’s heartthrob M S Dhoni. But first you should know that Sachin Tendulkar is married to a woman who is older to him and who is professionally a doctor; hardly a suitable combination for most Indian men.

The media and many Indian women went gaga over Dhoni and ignored a statement that talks about the idea of women in Indian society

“My ideal woman’ is someone who is caring, understanding and ready to compromise. Basically, I would like someone homely.”

Kartikey Sehgal

Women’s interest in cricket is a sudden development, propelled mostly by the advertisements projecting cricketers as demigods. In the year 2003, model and actress Mandira Bedi became popular for hosting a cricket-discussion program during the World Cup cricket matches.

Her immense popularity had little to do with her knowledge about cricket and more with the plunging neckline of her saris and the unavoidable amount of cleavage on exhibit.

Passionate about cricket? Mandira Bedi has succeeded in adding sexual interest to the sport. And only that.

Today, women are seen cheering for their favourite players on television and attending cricket-celebration parties at pubs and restaurants where they join the men in post-cricket drunken revelry. And these women don’t watch women’s cricket.

They do not know about the captain of the Indian women cricket team and they don’t cheer for them at pubs and discos. Advertisers spend lesser money on women’s cricket because most women don’t bother to attend the matches and there has never been a strong demand for women cricket.

Fact: Most women don’t know the sport. And their cheering and fan-following has more sexual tones than any proof of their love for the sport. This is perfectly healthy. However, it is a problem if these women start commenting on cricket and assume the role of critics. They are fooling their self and adding to their misery. They may feel left out during cricketing discussions because their knowledge is immature.

Women are watching cricket because men watch it a lot. And watching cricket brings attention to women. It is enough for most women to know the names of the players and which player is ‘hot property’. Cricketers parade on ramp shows and women accompany them or foreign models dance around them. These women don’t know the meaning of a reverse-sweep. They don’t know if the batsman’s strength lies in his front-foot strokes or his back foot-drives. They don’t even know the meanings of drives and hooks. They will parade around the cricketer because he makes lots of money and is seen on television. And standing next to a cricketer would give the models lots of attention. These advertisements tell the women sitting at home that cricketers are successful people because they play cricket; never mind their stature in the sport, their technique or their skills. 

Advertisers are selling cricket and women are being naïve in accepting the advertisement.

Not celebrated by Indian women: Jhulan Goswami is recognised as the fastest bowler in women's cricket. She was recently appointed as the captain of the Indian team.

Now say the advertisers decide that women ought to be educated about the sport to sustain their interest. They hire models (Ruby Bhatia, Mandira Bedi) to talk about cricket on television. These models are not expected to know much about the sport. They have been hired so that they can make the men talk about the sport. Also note that actual women-cricketers are not asked to do this job, ostensibly because they do not project sexiness.

Once again, there would be women who wouldn’t watch the cricket chat programs to learn about the sport but would wait for something ‘exciting’ to happen in the sport. This is healthy; the women know what they want from the sport and they are not feigning any extra interest in the sport. But there would be women who would hear opinions about the sport from the models and the experts who talk on television.

Television offers mostly opinions and not much wisdom about the sport. The experts contradict themselves and the viewer does not know about the back-foot punch that is discussed on the shows. As such, to know the sport, actual practice and demonstration along with a regular and a keen interest in the sport seem imperative. I have met women who don’t have much idea about the sport except from what they hear and read from media.

A woman told me that she loved M.S. Dhoni because he looks good and also because he played well. However, she was unable to tell me what she liked about Dhoni’s batting. She did not know what the term ‘average’ meant in cricket. She wrongly associated it with the average age of the players. [Average: Number of runs scored per match]

Another girl said that Sachin Tendulkar has never really won matches for India. She heard it on some television news channel. She didn’t know how matches are to be won. “You play well and you win matches for India.” I asked her if Sachin’s position as a middle order batsman would help him finish matches and raise his personal scoring average. She was clueless. The women mentioned are educated and have opinions on several women-related issues. Neither of them had seen Ricky Ponting bat but knew that he is good player based on newspapers and television channels.

A telling sign of their understanding of the sport is their judgement of Rahul Dravid. The middle-order batsman is considered a role-model for players who wish to perfect their batting technique. Many men, fed on the modern wham-bam cricket, don’t like him because he doesn’t play ‘fast’, i.e. score his runs quickly. Women don’t like him because they have heard that men are losing interest in him. However, I did come across some women who like Rahul. He is a “sincere character” and “a gem of a person”. He is “quiet and non-aggressive” and a “thorough gentleman”. These women were not able to explain what they liked about his batting. They saw in him a man they may like to know; or a man who could be short-listed as “a husband material”.

Apart from troubling the cricketing sensibilities of men (and women), such women also reveal their unsurety; probably their need to hide their enchantment with sportsmen and to appear wise about the sport.

Despite the technological and informative era, women are misled by advertisements and useless shows on cricket that have permeated television and are, in fact  surrogates of advertising.

Less advertising money means less women fans for the Indian Hockey Team

It would be fair to say that such human behaviour applies to many other sporting and non-sporting fields. But note that the Indian hockey team has fitter and stronger players than the Indian cricket team and very few women see these men as pin-ups. Advertising (including surrogate) impedes the pure exposition of sexuality, and this exposition is healthy and essential for human beings. Women’s preferences are being dictated by advertisement in every sphere, including cricket.

My references to women are not restricted to any collective based on class or aptitude. Most women and men watching and adoring cricket is an extension of their sexual nature. It is not a judgement or a statement on the gender. Sexual nature is manifested in most of our decisions. It includes the decision to read this story on this website. 

Part One ends