Babumoshai

Can I use the term pseudo for Bengalis? Well, my friends in Calcutta and elsewhere, please spare me from using such a 'harsh' word. But then I am helpless. When I watch the Bengal's Leftist leaders, I am forced to use the word. When I watch their movies (I have stopped watching though after film producers had turned copycats with lots of dishum-dishum action-packed remakes of Bollywood-Hollywood movies flooded Tollygunge), I am convinced they are real fake. Babumoshais (gentleman) have become pretenders.

Then in football. Probably, I was told, it was their sera khela (favourite sport). But it isn’t. Just like losing their sheer joy of procuring a or a shrimp from a macher bajar (fish market), football too has ceased to be a passionate game for the Bongs. Ask any old-timer about cricket and he will tell you that it is a game played by imperialists. But it is not that Bangalis don't love cricket. Any given day, they throng the hallowed Eden Gardens to watch any ODIs and the disco dance of cricket -- T20. I was also told that the passion generated by cricket was nothing compared to that generated by the daddy of all games – football which is mostly played at the Maidan.

Gone are the days when offices would empty before schedule during a Mohun Bagan-East Bengal match. Boseda, Ghoseda, masi maternal aunt), pisis(paternal aunt) and kakus (uncle) would get together and huddle over transistors with a somewhat tense face to organise support for either Bagan or East Bengal. Life used to come to a standstill.

Today in Calcutta we do get to see such football fans. But those has been restricted to only when there is a Bagan-EB match. Other teams exist but they are doing a mere formality. As for today’s generation of hiphop Bengalis (aloo dum, jhaal muri has been taken over by McDonald, burger, pizza and cola drinks has punched out kullar chais), cricket has knocked football off its pedestal. The jazzy marketing strategies of cricket or because of a certain Ganguly from Behala. Even those who still love football follow Manchester United more than Bagan and obsess over which club Cristiano Ronaldo, Ibrahimovic, Kaka will be playing for as opposed to Bhutia or a Chhetri. As a result of this lack of interest, Maidan football is slowly dying out.

The pride is gone and with it a Bengali tradition.