Of air pollution, denial and unfair accusation!

New Delhi : “The Lankans were faking it. They used air pollution as an excuse to deny Virat Kohli his triple hundred,” declared a middle-aged man, when a TV reporter asked him for his views on the pollution woes of the Sri Lankan players. “I’ve been living in Delhi for the last so many years, never had any problems. All this pollution, mask thing happened just to disrupt the game.”
It’s easy to see the gentleman was playing to the gallery. In a city where schools had to be shut down because of pollution, where so many people move around wearing anti-pollution masks, where occasionally vehicles run on alternate days depending on their registration numbers, how could someone not have faced any problem at all? Or maybe, he didn’t want to be seen admitting publically that there was a problem with his city. Anyway, as he blasted Lanka for creating an issue out of a non-issue, just about 10m away from him, there stood a couple of CRPF and Delhi Police personnel, their faces covered with masks. “The air gets really bad in winters, so we are issued these masks,” said a CRPF soldier. So even the fittest and the strongest amongst us are troubled by the toxic air!
Where is the problem!
The views of the above-mentioned random gentlemen are easy to dismiss. But the problem arises when people sitting in responsible positions talk more or less in the same way. It appears that BCCI’s acting president CK Khanna also believes there was no problem at all and the Lankans made mountain out of a molehill. “If 20,000 people in the stands did not have a problem and the Indian team did not face any issue, I wonder why Sri Lankan team made a big fuss. I will need to talk to the secretary and ask him to write to the Sri Lanka Cricket,” he had tweeted on Sunday. Well, perhaps the president missed the masked security personnel and several others going about their business with covered faces as he was being driven into the stadium!
And while the president felt there was no problem at all, India’s bowling coach Bharat Arun thought it wasn’t their problem if the visitors were suffering, and that it was Sri Lanka’s responsibility to keep their bowlers fit. He also assumed straightway that the Lankans were exaggerating their problems to disrupt the game. Apparently, he believes games can’t be disrupted because of pollution. Did he completely forget that two Ranji Trophy games were cancelled last year in Delhi because of smog and pollution? And that he was the coach of one of the teams involved, Hyderabad, and had spoken about how bad the conditions were?
We are used to it: Shami
On Monday, India pacer Mohammed Shami, too, accused the Lankans of overplaying their problem. Obviously pollution is a problem but it wasn’t as much as it was being shown,” Shami said.
But the Indian pacer balanced out his statement by, in a way, saying that maybe the Lankans were not used to high level of pollution. “It could be that we are used to it, we’ve been bearing it for some time now.” The Lankans indeed aren’t used to pollution, for the Air Quality Index in Colombo hovers around 50 (ranging from low to moderate). And by the way, a UNICEF report last year declared Sri Lanka as having the best air quality in South Asia. So, the likelihood of them having a genuine trouble is very, very high, and indulging in cheap tactics almost negligible.