Vedic Varnas of Indian team
Devdas
in Outlook on the caste of the WC team and a history
of how Brahmins have dominated Indian cricket for long.
Lets have a look at the caste of the Indian team
members. I may not have accurate info, so correct me
if you can. Also, i am not a casteist or communalist,
please don't use this post to give a speech on
how India should be beyond caste system et al. This
is just an attempt to analyze the distribution of
the different castes in the Indian team, nothing more
than that.
1. Sachin Tendulkar (Brahmin - Saraswat)
2. Virender Sehwag (Sudra - Jat)
3. Saurav Ganguly (Brahmin - Bhadralok)
4. Mohammad Kaif (Muslim - Sunni or Shia or Sufi - cricketwallah,
details?)
5. Yuvraj Singh (half Sikh, half Khatri(Kshatriya) - mother's surname
is Arora)
6. Rahul Dravid (Brahmin - i think he is Iyengar - mother is
Maharashtrian though)
7. Dinesh Mongia (Bania - Vaishya)
8. Harbhajan Singh (Sikh - is he Jat?)
9. Ashish Nehra (Khatri - Kshatriya)
10. Zaheer Khan (Pathan - equivalent of Kshatriya)
11. Javagal Srinath (Brahmin - Mysore Iyengar?? - don't know how he
acts
so brainless for a Brahmin btw :-)
12. Ajit Agarkar (Brahmin - Chitpavan)
13. Sanjay Bangar (Sudra)
14. Parthiv Patel (Sudra)
15. Anil Kumble (Brahmin - is he Canara Saraswat?)
Extra: VVS Laxman (Brahmin)
Dalmiya (Bania - Vaish) :-)
So, we have 6 Brahmins, 2 Kshatriyas, 1 Vaishyas and 3 Sudras among
the
12 Hindus of the World Cup team. Not bad as people complain that
low-castes
don't get a chance in the middle-class game of cricket. I am against
stereotyping but has anyone noticed how Brahmins rely more on
technique
and Kshatriyas and Jats(they are warriors) and Pathans rely more on
fighting spirit and firepower in their approach. Before the world cup,
we had heard statements from Sehwag that he dosen't fear any bowler in
the world while
Sachin even after all these years of dominating bowlers through his
technique has never uttered something daredevil like this and lets his
technique do the talking. Some of the other prominent Indians before
were Gavaskar(Brahmin), Vengsarkar(Brahmin),Vishwanath(Brahmin),
Shastri(Brahmin),
Srikanth(Brahmin), Mohinder(?? - Brahmin or is he Khatri), Kapil
Dev(Jat), Kambli(Dalit) etc. Its clear that the game was dominated by
Brahmins but what
is suprising is the negligible number of Kshatriyas or Rajputs in the
previous Indian teams. Or were they busy doing Zamindari in their
respective villages
in UP and Rajasthan??? Any comments??? :)
Devdas
Sandaas
> 12. Ajit Agarkar (Brahmin - Chitpavan)
You misspelled this one.It is Shitpavan - ghathispeak for fart.
>I am against
>.stereotyping but has anyone noticed
Me too, but I must admit Agarkar lived up to his hertiage - all gas and no fire.
>
> Devdas
Devadas Sandas bhai bhai
Sandeep S Bajwa
> is Arora)
>
Then Yuvraj Singh is half Jat Sikh and half Arora Sikh.
> 8. Harbhajan Singh (Sikh - is he Jat?)
>
Harbhajan Singh is a Ramgarhia Sikh. (Ramgarhia Sikhs so called as their
greatest leader was Jassa Singh Thoka
of village Ramgarh in Amritsar district who defeated the general of Ahmad
Shah Abdali at the siege of fort of Ram Rauni in 1760s)
Karan
>From: Sandeep S Bajwa sbaj...@yahoo.com
>> 5. Yuvraj Singh (half Sikh, half Khatri(Kshatriya) - mother's surname
>> is Arora)
>>
>
>Then Yuvraj Singh is half Jat Sikh and half Arora Sikh.
Yuvraj's mother is muslim.
Devdas
> Then Yuvraj Singh is half Jat Sikh and half Arora Sikh.
He can also be a Khatri Sikh,right?
> Harbhajan Singh is a Ramgarhia Sikh.
So he is a Sudra Sikh, i would imagine.
Devdas
jai
"Devdas" <devdas...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1a2685e3.03033...@posting.google.com...
> So, we have 6 Brahmins, 2 Kshatriyas, 1 Vaishyas and 3 Sudras among
> the
> 12 Hindus of the World Cup team. Not bad as people complain that
> low-castes
> don't get a chance in the middle-class game of cricket.
I think this has always been humbug. For example Vijay Hazare is one of the
most celebrated names of his time. What happens is that the people who are
confident with English catch media eye, those are the more educated/affluent
brahminish people.
One notable absence from Indian cricket (and much lamented) since Farokh
Engineer, are the Parsis. Extrovert, fun loving, eccentric and crowd
favorites, Parsi community which was once a pillar of Mumbai cricket has
faded over the last 3 decades.
I am against
> stereotyping but has anyone noticed how Brahmins rely more on
> technique
> and Kshatriyas and Jats(they are warriors) and Pathans rely more on
> fighting spirit and firepower in their approach. Before the world cup,
> we had heard statements from Sehwag that he dosen't fear any bowler in
> the world while
> Sachin even after all these years of dominating bowlers through his
> technique has never uttered something daredevil like this and lets his
> technique do the talking.
I don't see how this follows from your analysis. Fighting spirit and
firepower is not about press statements but manifested on field. Sachin is
the perfect balance of technique and firepower on the field. His best
friends cannot accuse Ganguly of having more technique than aggression :)
His lofted shots are distinctly un "brahminical" (borrowing from Cardus, who
wrote that Ranji never played a Christian shot in his life) ! And Zaheer
Khan has good "bowling technique" especially his runup and delivery leap.
Nehra's technique is poor for sure. Kumble has godawful technique for a
leggie but a tremendous fighting instnct. Sehwag is a bit loose outside
offstump but has some very good technique otherwise - on par with most
strokeplayers in the world today, of course his out and out aggression is a
product of environment (Najafgarh). Yuvraj, it's true, carries the
stereotypical aggression - a "gadhadhari bheem". So it's quite a mix,
really.
One stereotype is kind of true - Ganguly with his privileged background and
Bengali self belief has done a lot to rid our side of its traditional
inferiority complex and softness.
jai
Spaceman Spiff
jai <vp...@nospam.sbcglobal.net> drummed on his chest and bellowed:
> "Devdas" <devdas...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:1a2685e3.03033...@posting.google.com...
>
>> So, we have 6 Brahmins, 2 Kshatriyas, 1 Vaishyas and 3 Sudras among
>> the
>> 12 Hindus of the World Cup team. Not bad as people complain that
>> low-castes
>> don't get a chance in the middle-class game of cricket.
>
> I think this has always been humbug. For example Vijay Hazare is one
> of the most celebrated names of his time. What happens is that the
> people who are confident with English catch media eye, those are the
> more educated/affluent brahminish people.
>
--
stay cool,
Spaceman Spiff
I'm a road runner baby, got to keep on keeping on
I'm a road runner, one look at me and I'll be gone
You can love me if you want to, but I do declare
When I get restless I got to move somewhere
Narayanan
"Spaceman Spiff" <spaceman_spiff@no_spam_mail.com> wrote in message
news:zN%ha.28928$HR6....@nwrdny01.gnilink.net...
> Raising himself from all fours,
> jai <vp...@nospam.sbcglobal.net> drummed on his chest and bellowed:
> > "Devdas" <devdas...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> > news:1a2685e3.03033...@posting.google.com...
> >
> >> So, we have 6 Brahmins, 2 Kshatriyas, 1 Vaishyas and 3 Sudras among
> >> the
> >> 12 Hindus of the World Cup team. Not bad as people complain that
> >> low-castes
> >> don't get a chance in the middle-class game of cricket.
> >
> > I think this has always been humbug. For example Vijay Hazare is one
> > of the most celebrated names of his time. What happens is that the
> > people who are confident with English catch media eye, those are the
> > more educated/affluent brahminish people.
> >
> wasn't hazare a christian?
Yup he was. I remember there was a quiz in Illustrated weekly
sometime in mid 1980s on Christians to represent India.
At that time the count was 4.
Hazare, AG Kripal Singh, Binny & someone else. I guess that
was Chandu Borde.
Picadillyjim
"Narayanan" <tiger_va...@yahoo.com.spamnot> wrote in message
news:9340d5cf118a3e95...@news.teranews.com...
know anything about him, but the first cricket bat I owned had his name
written on it.
Harish
Narayanan
"Picadillyjim" <mykingdo...@email.com> wrote in message
news:b6an8l$3ch0r$1...@ID-55236.news.dfncis.de...
AGKS converted to christianity after marriage IIRC.
N-
Devdas
> I think this has always been humbug. For example Vijay Hazare is one of the
> most celebrated names of his time. What happens is that the people who are
> confident with English catch media eye, those are the more educated/affluent
> brahminish people.
I won't call Brahmins necessarily affluent :-). Majority of them
are middle class. The richer castes of India are the
Banias(among Gujjus, Marwaris and Sindhis), the Khatri punjabis of
Delhi and
the industrial Parsi community of Mumbai.
> I don't see how this follows from your analysis. Fighting spirit and
> firepower is not about press statements but manifested on field.
That was just an example of the kind of thinking among various people.
>Sachin is
> the perfect balance of technique and firepower on the field.
He is a stroke player thats all. Othewrise, i find more firepower
in Sehwag and Yuvraj shots. I mean majority of their shots lack
the desired "brahminical" technique but are good enough for flat
pitches where brute power and agression is required. You should
see how both of them struggle when the pitch is doing something and
against short rising balls. Sehwag is literally clueless and usually
just folds his hands to avoid the ball hitting his helmet instead
of ducking or taking his head away from the line of the ball. OTOH,
in a crunch situation i find Sehwag and Yuvraj displaying more
fighting
spirit than a Sachin who either dominates from ball one through his
technique
(pakistan game) to get us an easy win but 90% of the times fails when
the required run-rate is extremely high(Natwest) and wickets are
falling at
the other end.
> His best
> friends cannot accuse Ganguly of having more technique than aggression :)
> His lofted shots are distinctly un "brahminical"
See, Ganguly started off in 1996 as a quiet technical kind of fellow
at No.3 but has gradually deteriorated into the pricky kind of
fellow who appeals for a catch when the ball hits the ground or
getting into unnneccessary fights with the opponents
in the name of fighting spirit. I think he had the technique
to be a test batsman but has just not worked hard for 3-4 years since
he started doing well in onedayers. There are the Jayalalithas too for
every nice and quiet brahmin :-).
> Kumble has godawful technique for a
> leggie but a tremendous fighting instnct.
Kumble i would say has excellent technique as he can't turn the
ball yet is able to find success as a leg-spinner. He uses his
brain more than anything else to deceive the batsman with his
change of length and speed.
> One stereotype is kind of true - Ganguly with his privileged background and
> Bengali self belief
Bengali self beleif? I thought they were the lazy kind of guys.
I mean Bengal is one of the most decadent states living in the
pre-cold war communist era. No wonder Indian team has decayed into
a one-day team where youngsters doing well on flat pitches
are hyped up so much as to beleive the team is the best when
simple things like winning a series abroad or winning even a single
test in Aus/RSA are yet to be achieved. I will concede though
that he has the bengali temper and communist stubbornness though :-)
Devdas
Amol Cricketwallah
> news:zN%ha.28928$HR6....@nwrdny01.gnilink.net...
> > Raising himself from all fours,
> > jai <vp...@nospam.sbcglobal.net> drummed on his chest and bellowed:
> > > "Devdas" <devdas...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> > > news:1a2685e3.03033...@posting.google.com...
> > >
> > >> So, we have 6 Brahmins, 2 Kshatriyas, 1 Vaishyas and 3 Sudras among
> > >> the
> > >> 12 Hindus of the World Cup team. Not bad as people complain that
> > >> low-castes
> > >> don't get a chance in the middle-class game of cricket.
> > >
> > > I think this has always been humbug. For example Vijay Hazare is one
> > > of the most celebrated names of his time. What happens is that the
> > > people who are confident with English catch media eye, those are the
> > > more educated/affluent brahminish people.
> > >
> > wasn't hazare a christian?
>
> Yup he was. I remember there was a quiz in Illustrated weekly
Do we actually know the current caste-composition of the Indian team,
BTW, or is it mostly just conjecture as listed above? Because it did
seem to be mostly conjecture above - and I for one would like to
know if anyone actually has the information.
Historically there has always been a big caste-divide in Indian cricket,
in the sense that lower-caste players have never really made it to the
national side. I disagree with Jai above - this is not "humbug", but
fact historically. Doesnt mean it was due to discrimination or anything
like that, but mostly due to opportunity - cricket was almost entirely
a middle-class and upper-caste game in India for all these years, until
very very recently. Those were the only "groups" of people who really
had much of an opportunity to play, historically, and thus they were
the groups that formed most of first-class cricket and consequently
test cricket in India. This started changing only with time, when cricket
spread more, became less of an exclusively "city game" in India, and
spread to all parts of the country and included all groups.
Until the mid-80s, only 2 players of even middling-to-lower-caste had
ever played for India in history - and the population of India that
is not exclusively upper-caste has a much much higher percentage than
that, of course. It was almost entirely a function of opportunity (for
example, one of the 2 players of supposedly lowerish-caste who had
played for India until the 1980s was Eknath Solkar - and he got the
opportunity because his father was a mali, the groundsman of Bombay
Gymkhana, which enabled Solkar to get a fair bit of opportunity in
his youth).
As for Hazare listed above - he *was* Christian. He was Vijay Samuel
Hazare - and he played for and captained "The Rest" in the Pentangulars
in Bombay in the 1930s and 1940s (the 5 teams were The Hindus, The
Muslims, The Parsis, The Europeans and The Rest - which included
Christians, Sikhs etc).
BTW, it is instructive to see just how much of a purely "town game"
cricket was in the old days in India - and also how much of an
exclusive caste-wise and class-wise, and also education-level and
economic-level wise it really was.
In the last 1970s the Austrlian scholar Richard Cashman investigated
the social backgrounds of Indian cricketers (I believe this was in
his book "Players, Patrons and The Crowd", his book on Indian cricket).
At the time of his research, 143 players had been capped by India in
test cricket. Of those 143 players, a grand total of *SEVEN* had been
born in a village (and all of those 7 had moved to a town shortly
after birth anyway) - and everyone who went to school in India knows
that almost 80% of India was village even as late as the 1980s. This
shows just how large-town-oriented the game was. And even then there
was a discrepancy - a full 70 players were born in provincial or
national *capitals*. And 49 more came from district and divisional
towns.
Also Indian cricket was restricted to the better educated, relatively,
of the country. Out of the 143 players who had played for India by
the late 1970s, no less than 81 were college graduates (and another
49 had high school certificates). In a country with as low a literacy
rate as India has historically had, that is surely a stratospheric
figure.
(This, BTW, has changed totally and completely and probably irreversibly
in India now. Very few of the players who have emerged into the
Indian team from the 1990s onwards are college graduates, and most
probably never will be. The Sachin's, the Sehwag's, the Yuvraj's, the
Kaif's, and now the Parthiv's etc - all of these players were going
to play cricket as a career and it was obvious from the time they were
about 15 or earlier, and they didnt come close to completing college.
And increasing numbers of players never will. When Laxmi Ratan Shukla
was selected for India at the age of 18 and was missing his "Board
Exams" at the time due to some camps, he was asked about it - and his
response, which I still recall to this day, was "Bhad mein jaye
college" :-) This has also severely damaged University Level cricket
of course - in the old days when Gavaskar was coming up, for example,
the Inter-University Rohinton Baria tournament was a very big deal,
and players who did outstandingly well there even came into national
contention as a result. Even as late as the early 1980s it was a fairly
big deal - Azhar came into some sort of national prominence at that
level too, for example (Sanjay Manjrekar first played against Azhar
at the Rohinton Baria, to give one example). But today the Rohinton
Baria is irrelevant - nobody of note ever emerges from there into
national contention anymore, because most of the really good players
never get to that high a level of University to start with, they are
full-time cricketers (or in industry) well before that.
Also, BTW, Cashman also provided in his research the occupation of
the father's of most of the 143 India caps at the time (I really have
to track this book down the next time Iam home - so far Iam only going
on extracts I have elsewhere :-) Thus the "social status" of Indian
cricketers is fairly clear. And it was consistently fairly high - most
of the players were apparently sons of lawyers, bank officers and
minor bureaucrats. Some were sons of police inspectors, store-keepers
and school-teachers. The father of one, apparently, was the peshkar
(accountant) of the Tirupathi Temple itself! (Wonder who this was,
anyone know? :-) And, moving further up the scale, 3 test cricketers
were sons of industrialists, and no less than 7 were son of Rajas
or Maharajas :-)
> sometime in mid 1980s on Christians to represent India.
> At that time the count was 4.
> Hazare, AG Kripal Singh, Binny & someone else. I guess that
> was Chandu Borde.
The question was asked about AG Kripal Singh elsewhere in this thread -
and he was indeed a Christian, converted to it after marriage. In fact
it is one of those great trivia questions - he is possibly the only
player to have played international cricket as a member of 2 separate
religions during his career (he was a Sikh when he made his test
debut, then got married and converted, and then played test cricket
as a Christian for a while longer).
BTW, was Borde a Christian? Not sure I recall - he was Chandrakant
Gulabrao Borde, at any rate. There's David Johnson - but he was
after the mid-80s. As was Kuruvilla.
Sadiq [ 11 Parsis at last count, IIRC ] Yusuf
Narayanan
"Amol Cricketwallah" <cricke...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
> Do we actually know the current caste-composition of the Indian team,
> BTW, or is it mostly just conjecture as listed above? Because it did
> seem to be mostly conjecture above
It did seem to be a conjecture. Srinath's father's name is
Chandrashekar which most likely is not an Iyengar name.
But then you can't be certain.
> Historically there has always been a big caste-divide in Indian cricket,
> in the sense that lower-caste players have never really made it to the
> national side. I disagree with Jai above - this is not "humbug", but
> fact historically. Doesnt mean it was due to discrimination or anything
> like that, but mostly due to opportunity - cricket was almost entirely
> a middle-class and upper-caste game in India for all these years, until
> very very recently.
All very true. It is hard to recollect any cricketer prior to Kapil
from a rustic background/lower strata. Kapil did bring a welcome
change, though not completely.
> In the last 1970s the Austrlian scholar Richard Cashman investigated
> the social backgrounds of Indian cricketers (I believe this was in
> his book "Players, Patrons and The Crowd", his book on Indian cricket).
> At the time of his research, 143 players had been capped by India in
> test cricket. Of those 143 players, a grand total of *SEVEN* had been
> born in a village (and all of those 7 had moved to a town shortly
> after birth anyway) - and everyone who went to school in India knows
> that almost 80% of India was village even as late as the 1980s.
Accding to 1981 census, we were 42% literate. Villages were/are much
worse than national avg. The question of cricket training in a village
doesn't arise
> And increasing numbers of players never will. When Laxmi Ratan Shukla
> was selected for India at the age of 18 and was missing his "Board
> Exams" at the time due to some camps, he was asked about it - and his
> response, which I still recall to this day, was "Bhad mein jaye
> college" :-)
LOL! But the guy promptly got married after was sure that he would not
make it to the team.
>
> BTW, was Borde a Christian? Not sure I recall - he was Chandrakant
> Gulabrao Borde, at any rate. There's David Johnson - but he was
> after the mid-80s. As was Kuruvilla.
Noel David & Jacob Martin too.
N-
Devdas
> Do we actually know the current caste-composition of the Indian team,
> BTW, or is it mostly just conjecture as listed above? Because it did
> seem to be mostly conjecture above
Is this some sort of vain pride or arrogance? Do you think
only you write authentic stuff in your long posts and
other just blurt off nonsense without verifying? :) How
about challenging some of what i wrote if you think it
is pure conjecture?
> Historically there has always been a big caste-divide in Indian cricket,
> in the sense that lower-caste players have never really made it to the
> national side. I disagree with Jai above - this is not "humbug", but
> fact historically. Doesnt mean it was due to discrimination or anything
> like that, but mostly due to opportunity - cricket was almost entirely
> a middle-class and upper-caste game in India for all these years, until
> very very recently.
> Those were the only "groups" of people who really
> had much of an opportunity to play, historically
*Yawn* It is a known fact and has been discussed in the original post.
What JNat and I were saying is that even today people complain that
cricket is an upper-caste game because of discrimination when there
are
quiet a few Sudras playing the game. It is but obvious that the person
with the facilities for playing cricket can become a cricketer and
most of the relatively well off persons in India are people of
Brahmin/Kshatriya/Vaish
heritage. It is like saying why there are not so many blacks in the
white-collar jobs in USA. But the reverse logic also holds. There are
so
many people of Sindhi/Marwari/Gujju heritage who don't take to
cricket even being so well off. But another major reason to the
Brahmin stronghold in cricket is the game of cricket itself and the
way it is played. For example, the game of hockey in India is
dominated by Sikhs/Dalits and you will practically find no Brahmins
playing hockey. It should be obvious that hockey is more of a physical
game and Brahmins don't take to such sports. Cricket is less of a
physical game compared to hockey and football and more of a technical
game and no wonder Brahmins have dominated it for long. Take
Chess as another example and ask Vishwanathan Iyer Anand how he
would feel playing hockey :). This was what was touched by Outlook
in their edition published in February(you can check it out).
> BTW, was Borde a Christian? Not sure I recall - he was Chandrakant
> Gulabrao Borde, at any rate.
I read somewhere that he is a baptised christian like Kiran
More.
Devdas
cricfan
"Narayanan" <tiger_va...@yahoo.com.spamnot> wrote in message
>
> "Amol Cricketwallah" <cricke...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
>
> > Do we actually know the current caste-composition of the Indian team,
> > BTW, or is it mostly just conjecture as listed above? Because it did
> > seem to be mostly conjecture above
>
> It did seem to be a conjecture. Srinath's father's name is
> Chandrashekar which most likely is not an Iyengar name.
> But then you can't be certain.
Both Kumble and Srinath are Smartha Brahmins (Kannada) and not Iyengars.
To put in simplistic terms, Smarthas are followers of the Advaita philosophy
(Adi Sankara). So were
Chandra and Vishy (who was a "babbur-kammi" Smartha). Prasanna was a Madhwa
brahmin
as were Vijay Bharadwaj and Sunil Joshi. Again, in simpilistic terms,
Madhwas are followers of the Dvaita philosophy (Madhvacharya). Rahul Dravid
is a
Deshasta brahmin - but dunno if he is a Madhwa, since many Madhwa deshathas,
- some of my relatives among them - speak a language which they claim to be
Marathi. [Having
grown up in Maharashtra, I find their language appalling:-)] All of the
above cricketers,
incidentally, are college grads - three of them are engineers.
This takes me back to the discussion on city-caste-background in r.s.c some
years back.
Laters..
Cheers
Arun
DiiVolunt
Saurav ganguly is Kayastha (Gangopadhyaya) there is no Bhadraloka
varna
though many bengalis claim brahminhood while being Kayasthas.
dinesh Mongia is Rajput
Khatris are not Khshatriyas. Yuvraj Singh is Khatri-Khatri from father
and mother
Nehras are Khatris not Kshatriyas.
I think Sehwag might be Khatri too. name suggests non farming
occupation.
And not all sikhs are jats and not all jats are sikhs and most famous
jat in rsc, Kapil dev is not a Jat, he is carpenter caste.
regards
DiiVolunt
devdas...@yahoo.com (Devdas) wrote in message news:<1a2685e3.03033...@posting.google.com>...