Cricket’s Deity, Dalai and Encyclopedia

Short takes

By

Randeep Wadehra

Sachin: A Hundred Hundreds Now by V. Krishnaswamy

Harper Sport. Pages: xiv+261. Price: Rs. 250/-

Arguably the greatest cricketer ever to wield the willow, Sachin Tendulkar – often referred to as the God of Cricket – remains a favourite subject for various academic, intellectual and casual discourses. So, another book on the cricketing legend comes as no surprise, especially when it celebrates his century of centuries. On his debut in Karachi he gave sufficient evidence of what he was capable of. Cricket experts described him as the embodiment the Sunil Gavaskar style. However, ever so gradually, he carved out not just a niche but an entire realm of which he became the undisputed monarch. There is hardly any batting record that he has not set. His enthusiasm for the game saw him become a respectable bowler and an agile fielder, too. His first century came in the second innings of his ninth test match at Old Trafford, Manchester; setting him off on a trail that would leave other cricketing greats way behind. Some, like Brian Lara, did offer credible challenge, but eventually Sachin’s class manifested itself. Beginning with his debut year 1990 and ending in 2012 when he scored his hundredth hundred, this volume takes a comprehensive look at the rise and rise of Sachin Tendulkar – providing interesting asides and insights into the man and his game.

Beyond Religion by The Dalai Lama

Harper Collins-India Today. Pages: xv+188. Price: Rs. 399/-

When someone like the Dalai observes that prayers do not yield any tangible results whereas modern science does, you have to sit up and take notice. However, while reading this volume, you realize that far from denouncing religion His Holiness is emphasizing the importance of ethics. According to him, one is not born with a religion and it is not really essential for one’s survival in this world. But a set of ethics are vital in the same way as water is to life. Religion is more like tea – its ingredients lend color and flavor to water, but do not in any way become indispensible. He lays great stress upon common human values that “do not rely upon any religious principles”.

The Indian version of secularism envisages respect for all religions, i.e., you can be secular and yet remain religious, whereas the western one pits state against the church and, therefore, in order to be secular you have to renounce religion, i.e., become an atheist. The Dalai Lama’s emphasis is on ethics. This book’s subtitle says it all, “Ethics for a whole world”; a reiteration of Buddha’s Eight-Fold-Path principles. Overall, the narrative sows the seeds for an avant-garde value based civilization where religions may become redundant or, at least, be subordinated to a set of universal ethics.

International Encyclopedia of Abbreviations by IB Verma

BP Publishers and Distributors. Pages: viii+831 (Two Volumes). Price: Rs. 1995/-

It is common for one to come across abbreviations in newspapers and books. These may refer to an organization – for example IMF (International Monetary Fund), a document like the promissory note, viz., IOU (I owe you), a technological term like IP (Internet Protocol), or a medical test like LD-50 (Lethal Dose Fifty Percent) conducted on animals. Abbreviations are useful in several ways. Firstly these are easy to remember, and therefore have a great recall value. Secondly, professionals find them useful as part of their jargon – instead of using a longish or tongue twisting scientific term or formula its abbreviated form would be easy to pronounce, communicate and understand.

Verma has done a good job by painstakingly collecting various abbreviations for this encyclopedia. Not only has he presented these in the alphabetical order, along with their full forms, but also given short explanatory notes that would help even a layman to understand what these terms actually stand for.

Published in The Tribune dated July 29, 2012