HI

Fact 1: Quoting Hockey India President, head cheapstake, A.K.Mattoo, when asked about the players’ demand of Rs. 4.5 lakhs each –

“It adds up to nearly Rs. 1.08 crore. We don’t have that kind of money. We told them we have around Rs 30 lakh in our kitty and are ready to distribute Rs. 20 lakh. But it seems, for them, money is more important than playing for the country.”

Fact 2: Some figures released by Sahara India, in their annual report –

“Sahara India has signed a four-year deal with India’s shooting, boxing and wrestling federations, paying the players Rs. 2 lakh to Rs. 18 lakh per year, without adoring any logo.

Sahara had also struck a deal with Hockey India for the men and women’s team, but here, due to the complicated structure of this ad-hoc body, the money is paid to the federation itself. Thus there is no cash incentive for the players. In keeping with this deal, Hockey India received Rs. 1.78 crore for May 2009 to April 2010.”

So, in a teacup: HI received, from a single sponsor, Rs. 1.78 crore. HI Chief, Mr. Mattoo tells us, they have Rs 30 lakh ‘in their kitty’.

So the question is, where was the remaining Rs. 1,48,00,000 spent, Mr Mattoo?

Did you get yourself a new Mercedes?

Wadians

Six months ago, something happened. Of course, six months ago loads of stuff happened, but among that stuff there was something pretty unremarkable- at-the-time and yet quite-significant-now. I decided to undertake a study of a race of beings quite different from the ones I have become accustomed to over the past few years. Which, by the way, is just a cool way of saying I joined the Nowrosjee Wadia College of Arts and Sciences, Pune.

So the story until now goes something like this: Having spent (read wasted) so many months in the company of these creatures known as the Wadians, and having eventually earned the right to even call myself one, I have formed a few conclusions, one of which is a bit in doubt.

BY observing them long enough, if there’s one thing I’m sure of, it’s that these things, whatever they are, are radically different from all other humans. And the possible reasons for this are only two, both theorized by my Mother almost 2yrs back, when she sat watching T.V and tried guessing why exactly Inzammam Ul-Haq was the way he was.

Anyway the reasons are: 1) They’re all either too unbelievably DUMB to stick to the usual norms of civilized living, or 2) they’re so incredibly SMART, and so far ahead of the rest of us in most fields, that the stuff they say tends to sound a bit odd.

I myself am inclined to considering neither possibility. Being a Wadian myself now, it just doesn’t seem fair if I continue with this study. So I’m resorting to the only other means I have of solving something like this. That is, put it up on Facebook and see what people say.

So that’s what I’m doing now. I am posting only a very tiny part of my extensive research over the past 6 months. By showcasing this much, I hope that the people reading this will be smart enough (or hey, dumb enough) to form their own opinions about the species known as Wadians, and thus be saved from shock or surprise whenever they next meet one.

What I put up is this: Over the last few months, being still largely unaccustomed to the usual way of doing things around here, I ended up greeting people wherever I went, with the incredibly normal, very Hutchings-era, thoroughly average Question: What’s Up?

Now you’d think I would get a variety of answers, but hey, you aren’t a Wadian, so what do you know? I got just the same reply, again and again and again. What really makes this worth noticing is that every chap who said it, did so with the air that he was quite obviously the first person to have thought up something so smart, so witty, that it blew me away. It really did.

Q: Hi! What’s up?

The Reply of an average Wadian:

http://www.esnips.com/doc/d39847fd-b399-4875-8df8-94069eacc1f3/Wad1

I lied. There were TWO answers. The next one’s a bit of a rarity, said only by the few exceptional people walking around the place, people who probably don’t really belong there.

Q: What’s up?

The Reply of the slightly more sophisticated Wadian:

http://www.esnips.com/doc/6af9006c-c773-489a-b945-267958b714c0/Wad2

Happy to have helped.

Cheers.