BENGALURU: Years ago, my friends and I were faced with a situation that had us stumped while playing cricket we played in the restricted space which served as a playground in our building. Because of the limitations, we had to tweak the rules, so the LBW (Leg Before Wicket) rule was out to allow the batsman a better chance at surviving and scoring runs.
One of my friends always wore a lungi while playing cricket — and that’s what stumped us! At first we joked and laughed at it. He rolled it up to above his knees while fielding/bowling, and rolled it down to its full length till his ankles while batting — disregarding the obstruction it caused while running between the wickets.
We soon learnt why he did that: No bowler could get him out bowled! With no LBW rule, all he had to do was face a trickier bowler squarely and spread his legs to let his lungi — which then extended like a taut curtain — stop the ball from hitting the wickets.
This frustrated the opposite team members — including me. Initially we objected; but there was no set rule on what to wear while playing cricket in our building. So we had to improvise our bowling and strategies in such a way that we could take his wicket by getting him caught, or get him run out — the latter more frequently achieved as the lungi restricted his running!
Basically, we learnt to live with what he called his “right” to wear what he wanted while playing cricket, and we got on with the game after the initial objections.
This reminiscence has no links with the ongoing Hijab issue, except for the part of “getting on with the game”. Had we continued objecting to and making a hue and cry over my friend’s dressing habit while playing cricket, it would not have closed down educational institutions or affected children’s education in any way, but it certainly would have spoiled our game of cricket...and a much-valued friendship.
My friend wearing a lungi rolled down to his ankles did not amount to cheating because there was no rule prohibiting the wearing of the attire while playing cricket. It served his purpose in the given framework of the rules that we ourselves had tweaked.
The experience with my lungi-wearing friend did not threaten anything with adverse consequences as does the ongoing issue which threatens not only the education of children but also our pluralistic society — only because more number of people with their respective agendas are taking sides on an issue which actually has no bearing on the education that it is ending up impacting.
Social and cultural psychologist Jonathan Haidt, in his book The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided By Politics And Religion, cites from the New Testament: “Why do you see the speck in your neighbour’s eye, but do not notice the log in your own eye?... first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your neighbour’s eye.” (Matthew 7:3-5)
Haidt says taking “the logs out of our own eyes” helps escape from the “ceaseless, petty and divisive moralism”. He then cites the eighth century Chinese Zen master Sen-ts’an:
“The Perfect Way is only difficult for those who pick and choose; Do not like, do not dislike; all will then be clear. Make a hairbreadth difference, and Heaven and Earth are set apart; If you want the truth to stand clear before you, never be for or against. The struggle between ‘For’ and ‘Against’ is the mind’s worst disease.”