Justice Undone

         The style of an ideal media reporter is different, his eyes might always be scanning the premises around, perhaps like Sherlock Homes. He knows the art of converting an irrelevant development into a hit news. The sports reporter I speak of was in a hurry to leave the bar floor of a Bangalore Hotel, after a few sips. Suddenly his eyes flashed, one of the faces he saw aside a corner table seemed to be quite familiar for him. A thought that he himself has covered this young man flashed through again and again. ‘Oh! Its’ Vishy!’ He murmured. ‘Yeah…it is the same Sadanand Viswanath, India’s one time poster boy. But, why does he look quite lost? The reporter had many more questions to get answered.

It was Vishy, the 23 year old fire bowler who flew many bails off to the midfield and who was mostly instrumental in snatching the Cricket World Cup for India in 1985. The enthusiasm that always filled  his eyes was unique and uptight. The journalist wondered why he disappeared from the scene just after three tests and twenty two one days. He walked towards the guy, looked at his face sharp and asked, “Aren’t you Vishy?” Vishy looked at his strange face for a while. They sat there looking face to face for a while. Vishy looked as if finding a space to land all his miseries. He slowly spoke to him about his painful boyhood, early loss of parents, lost love and finally how he tunneled himself into the Indian Team.

He said that he later worked in a Dubai firm but could not settle there; then came back and worked in a hotel for a while. Vishy finished his touching story. It seemed as if he was justifying the random careless life he led. The journalist slowly stood up and asked him, “Did you do justice to yourself?” He walked out, once again leaving Vishy back in his private world of disappointments.

Years passed by. This reporter was walking into Chinnaswami Stadium Bangalore, busy with a Test Match going on. To his surprise, the journalist saw the same Vishy walking into the stadium. It was not the same desperate man whom he saw in the bar, some years back. Vishy looked quite charged and he could trace the same old enthusiasm in his eyes. Vishy said that he is currently a first class umpire and a powerful coach. He continued, “I admit that I cannot still say that I have done justice to me. However, I have stopped drinking and have begun living as best as I can.”  As this live story of the rise, fall and rise of a genius flashed through, what I thought about was finding an appropriate answer to the question of the journalist, if it was asked to me. There could not be many  who might daringly say “Yes, I have.” 

Joseph Mattappally