In a country where jobs are increasingly scarce even for well-educated graduates from middle class families, for youngsters from less affluent families the avenues for gainful employment are fewer still. In such a country, the IPL has been godsend for the children of the less affluent – it offers them a ticket to prosperity with far better odds of success than the increasingly hopeless entrance exams to enter government jobs with (0.2% or less chance of success). Mohammed Siraj in Hyderabad and Rinku Singh in Aligarh understood this and grabbed the IPL opportunity with both hands. However, financing their training & nutrition were their parents who put everything on the line to provide whatever they could for their sons. If true patriotism is about putting your family ahead of yourself, if national service is about working hard to provide a better life for the next generation, then Siraj’s parents and Rinku’s parents are the Indians we should really cheer for. As Sandeep Dwivedi’s explains:
“There is this heart-warming video from last year about Indian cricketer Rinku Singh moving into his 500 square-yard two-storey villa with a pool, a lift, walk-in wardrobe and front-lawn with a swing, on YouTube. It’s a touching house tour by his proud and beaming sister Neha Singh…
It’s the day the family has moved from their two-room derelict shack in a gas-cylinder stockyard, to Aligarh’s new tony address – the gated township where homes have chandeliers hanging from high-ceilings and spacious balconies with faux-grass.
Away from the din of family and friends, sits father Khanchand Singh. Back in the day, he could lug a few gas cylinders on his cycle and deliver them around the city. Now, he looks frail. Neha, in the house-warming video, can be heard asking him to have an early meal. He is too pleased for words, happy to be in the home that his son built for the family, but he doesn’t seem in the best of health.
Khanchand on Friday, lost a long, painful battle with cancer…
It was in a school cricket tournament that Rinku dazzled Aligarh with lusty sixes. His reward was a motorcycle and it changed his life forever. The good son would give the bike to his father, who could now increase his gas-cylinder delivery trips without getting too tired….
Social media…has a grainy photo captured from the stands, that has a very touching frame. Possibly shot minutes after Rinku got to know the news he dreaded the most. It has Mohammad Siraj putting a hand around his shoulder and walking him out of the field.
Siraj knows what Rinku would be feeling. During the Covid 2021 days, he lost his father, the only man who believed in him. Siraj was in Australia, he could not travel to India. The auto-driver, well below poverty line, couldn’t give his son financial support…The day he got his first IPL cheque, he asked his father to retire the auto…”
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