ThePrint asks:
Should Delhi be struck off as an international cricket venue because of pollution?
The pollution problem has plagued Delhi for the past few years, and has not been adequately addressed. This is something everybody is aware of. Stoppage of play in an international sports event only brings it into sharper focus, and one hopes authorities will now take the issue more seriously than earlier.
Sceptics have suggested that the Sri Lankans got into ‘theatrical’ excuse-making because they were being hammered in the match. But if we see the proceedings carefully, there were a lot more people than just the Sri Lankans wearing masks, including spectators and even some from the Indian dressing room.
Everybody has the right to be concerned about their well-being and health. Even a cursory glance of newspapers in Delhi will tell you that this concern about smog and pollution is topmost on Delhi-wallahs’ minds. So why fault the Sri Lankans?
Read other perspectives on the smog affecting Sri Lanka vs India test match:
Sheila Dikshit, former chief minister of Delhi
Anurag Thakur, former president, BCCI
Whatever their compunctions, the ‘friendly neighbours’ did not stage a walk-off, but resumed playing, albeit after an extended stoppage. Indeed, imagine the furore — and the assault by the media of those countries — if the visiting team had been England or Australia?
How can a recurrence of such an event be prevented? Cricket is a winter sport in India, and this is not the first time a match is being played in Delhi in these months. Indeed, the capital has been a major Test venue ever since independence.
Little is achieved by rejigging the itinerary. There have been instances earlier too when play has been held up because of fog. To strike off Ferozeshah Kotla as a venue, as some have suggested, is skirting around the problem, which is smog caused by pollution.
That is the crux. It affects not just Delhi, as we now know, but almost the entire north during winter. It needs to be de-hyphenated from cricket, and tackled on a war footing. To see it only through the prism of the ongoing Test match is missing the wood for the trees.
Ayaz Memon is a sportswriter.