The Twenty20 opening match had started. And Chris Gayle launched into the ball, swatting it to the stands. Sitting at home in Delhi, what do I hear? Pramaadam shot....aaru run. I sharpen my ears, realise the commentary on Star Cricket is in Tamil. This continued for 3-4 overs, till the cable operator switched it to Hindi.
Perhaps the first time in a cricket telecast that the broadcaster organised commentary in a regional language. When Narain Karthikeyan made it to FI in 2005, Star Sports suddenly brought in Tamil commentary in a sport which does not have Hindi commentary, considering the urban, upper-middle class profile of followers.
But that was sparked off by an individual and not by mass following for the sport. Cricket on the other hand is a sport with a mass base in India. And it's high time sports broadcasters further explore the potential of regional languages to expand their audience. There is a market clueless in Hindi and not too comfortable with English. Fans will remain fans irrespective of the commentary, but if they can relate to the commentary, they certainly can have a better illusion of participation. And yes, we need to celebrate our diversity with such subtle, albeit market-driven acts.
What next, Malayalam or Bangla commentary for the next Football World Cup?
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2 comments:
Guess it might have something to do with Neo's plans (even Zee has been planning Tamil/Telugu commentary for the ICL, I heard)...Here's a link to an interview with an urban upper-middleclass man:
http://www.indiantelevision.com/interviews/y2k7/executive/shashi_kalathil_interview.php
Btw, I have started a small word-of-mouth campaign among the Indian community here that Tamil should also be called the national language (if they continued to call Hindi that)!
If Hindi qualifies for 'quantitative' reasons (30-35% of the population), then, Tamil should be there too for qualitative reasons! ('Tamil, one of the two classical languages of India, is the only language of contemporary India which is recognizably continuous with a classical past.'..."
A. K. Ramanujan in The Interior Landscape)
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