Bhajji outburst mirrors rift in media-player ties

Offie upset with his portrayal as an idiot by a TV channel

India’s top spinner now following the retirement of the legendary Anil Kumble, Harbhajan has attracted immense scrutiny over the last year and a half. He has had his moments, but the off-spinner hasn’t exactly strung together the consistency of Kumble and therefore has occasionally been panned by his critics, at times with justification but on a personal level too at other times.

Creative artistes – and a spin bowler will perforce fall into that category – don’t take kindly to criticism. India’s cricketers are particularly touchy when their performances are put under the microscope and in some ways, Harbhajan is no exception.

By his own confession, he needed an outlet to let off steam, and that outlet came courtesy his five-wicket haul in the second Test against South Africa which bowled India to a series-levelling innings victory.

The moment Steve Davis’ right index finger shot skywards to signal the end of Morne Morkel’s dogged resistance and usher in the Indian victory, Harbhajan took off on a searing sprint that brought him directly under the suspended press box at the Eden. Repeated punching of the fists and a string of verbals – difficult to hear but not difficult enough to guess – were directed towards the media personnel as he vented his pent-up anger and frustration.

“It has been inside me for a long time now, it had to come out at some stage,” Harbhajan said by way of explanation later on. “A lot of things have been said about me, this time you people are at the receiving end.”

Harbhajan had a point when he took exception to his portrayal as one of ‘three idiots’ by a television channel in the aftermath of the Nagpur debacle, when India lost by an innings and six runs and Harbhajan had figures of 46-1-166-2. Nobody, not even Sachin Tendulkar, has been either free from or immune to criticism; it’s when the criticism gets out of hand and assumes a needless personal, hurtful hue that the problem gets compounded.

In many ways, Harbhajan’s outburst perhaps mirrored a majority view within the Indian ranks. Internationally, India are infamous as one of the least media-friendly teams, especially in the last year and a half. There have been numerous instances of Indians skipping press conferences at the end of the day, like after a bad day in the field during the Ahmedabad Test against Sri Lanka, or indeed here in Kolkata, surprisingly on a day when both Tendulkar and Virender Sehwag made centuries.

For a long time, the player-media relationship in Indian cricket was symbiotic, each aware of the other’s requirements but also wary of not stepping on one another’s toes. The upsurge in the number of travelling journalists and the seemingly endless demand for ‘exclusives’ has now driven a massive wedge between the performers and the chroniclers, a situation not mutually beneficial at all, any which way you look at it.