IPL 2018: Why an 83-year-old CSK fan doesn't want to watch the finals
It is Whistle Podu time in Chennai and the city has been painted yellow. It is undeniable that MS Dhoni and his boys belonging to Chennai Super Kings (CSK) are the favourites in the town.
Well, Indian Paise, sorry Premier League, has brought home to every drawing room the exploits of these "elderly lads" - the "over 30 retirement brigade" - as they were christened after the auctions. They are household names after nine seasons. CSK did not play in the last two seasons thanks to a Supreme Court ordered suspension for "match-fixing". The yellow gang is back to fixing matches, but this time with sheer talent and experience.
That CSK was the cynosure of all eyes and ears hit me hard, as our car turned to the Buckingham Canal Road to enter the Chidambaram Stadium through the MJ Gopalan gate, with my daughter in tow. She was all decked up in a yellow Bharatanatyam costume for live recording on May 26, 2018, for a CSK show on Star Sports to be telecast throughout the day from the morning of May 27, 2018, before the finals between CSK and Sunrisers Hyderabad gets underway.
An old gentleman with a walking stick stopped our car and asked whether we were going for to Chepauk to watch CSK play. My yellow shirt and my daughter's costume must have led him to ask the question.
I told him, "Sir, the final is on May 27 in Mumbai. We are going for a CSK promo event that will be telecast on the day of finals."
Parthasarathy joined us. He said he has been a "mad fan of Dhoni ever since his wife of 55 years, Vani, left him and he was reliving his schooldays with a shameless Whistle Podu routine". He whistled with amazing effect with both his index fingers tucked into his mouth. He insisted he could be the anonymous "whistle-blower" on the show adding his good luck charm to Dhoni's team.
As we entered the recording space, under the famous scoreboard on Wallajah Road end, we saw a sea of yellow with yellow flags and drumbeats, not to mention the whistles. Parthasarathy quietly got down and walked into the yellow assembly and asked for a CSK T-shirt and proudly wore it to celebrate with an astonishing whistling interlude.
The producer was stunned at this old man's felicity and offered him a chair behind the camera with a mike in hand to whistle as the CSK fans got into the act.
Boy, oh boy, the old man whistled like no one else could.
Meanwhile, one after the other as performers got on camera, Parthasarathy was titled a whistling genius. It was a stunning performance from the 83-year-old thatha.
At the cost of sounding immodest, your's truly too joined the great whistling act, for old time's sake.
As the show wound down, Parthasarathy was in tears. Why? He said with his only son having flown away to US several decades ago and his wife dead, it was the boys in yellow, who kept him going. A cricket crazy old man, he has little interest in anything else.
He was sad the matches had to be moved out of Chennai because he used to religiously sit outside the stadium - as he could not afford the tickets - and follow the ebb and flow of the crowd's response coming from within the stadium.
As soon as the crowd heard this, everyone decided to pitch in to ensure he gets a ticket to watch the match in Mumbai. But Parthasarathy declined saying he didn't want to go to a CSK match without his wife. Ironically, his wife had died on a day CSK was playing. "She loved the team so much that CSK went on to win the game that day with her blessings," said an overwhelmed Parthasarathy.
Whether one calls T20 pyjama cricket or merely tamasha, the truth is that Tamil Nadu is addicted to it and hats off to Dhoni and his men for inspiring this dedication for the sport.
CSK thatha refused a lift back to his residence. He took his walking stick and strode back in small, tired steps but not before giving the gathering one last Whistle Podu, the whistle was meant to wish CSK all the best for the finals.