As a Test cricketer and the brashest commentator on Indian television, Navjot Singh Sidhu, got under the skin of some of the sport’s biggest names and offended millions of fans.
Now the 53-year-old jester is hoping to shake up India’s political scene by fronting the opposition Indian National Congress party’s bid to win back power in the state of Punjab, ridiculing opponents in his inimitable style.
“I’m here to hit them out the ground and out of our state,” he told a rally last week in the north of the state, smacking an imaginary six into the raucous crowd with a wafted bat.
Photo: AFP
The chief target of Sidhu’s sledging is Punjab’s leader Prakash Singh Badal, an 89-year-old ally of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi whose son, Sukhbir Singh Badal, is the state’s deputy chief minister.
The crowd roared with laughter when Sidhu quipped that “their roads are so full of potholes they turn the curd in your stomachs into lassi,” and “you promised 24-hour free electricity, but we only have power for 12 hours a day — the remaining 12 hours are free of power.”
Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, whose anti-corruption party also has designs on the state, was denounced as a reboot of Britain’s colonial era East India Company for wanting “to rule Punjab by remote control.”
It is entertaining stuff, but commentators and critics say Sidhu is mainly motivated by a desire to damage former colleagues in Modi’s right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and is vague on policies.
Sidhu was furious when he was dumped as a BJP candidate in the 2014 general election, forced to make way for Modi’s top lieutenant Arun Jaitley, who then lost the seat.
The center-left Congress, which has floundered since losing power at the national level, was delighted for such a crowd-pleaser to join its ranks and become the face of their campaign in the state.
Supporters hope victory in Punjab could spur a wider revival for the party which is also hoping to defeat the BJP when the giant state of Uttar Pradesh begins holding elections later this month.
“What has worked for him from the start, from his playing days, is the image of an independent, eccentric person,” said Hartosh Singh Bal, political editor of the Caravan current affairs magazine.
“Even when he batted, on some days you’d see a totally defensive Sidhu and on others he’d only deal in sixes. I think maybe the word maverick fits him better than just an eccentric,” he said.
With his razor-sharp wit and colorful turbans — usually paired with a matching blazer-pocket handkerchief — Sidhu forged a successful career as a pundit after retirement before also becoming a game show host.
His shoot-from-the-hip style has frequently landed him in hot water such as when he threatened to club Pakistan’s Aamer Sohail with a bat during a Test match.
He got up the nose of England legend Geoffrey Boycott, telling him on air that “you are like a ship stuck in a fog. You just keep blowing your horn. You know nothing of what you are talking.”
His regular digs at Bangladesh’s team have made Sidhu a bete noire among fans of Test cricket’s newest nation who set up a Web site during the last World Cup to allow visitors to virtually whack him with a shoe.
Pundits’ predictions for the outcome of the Punjab elections are mixed, but Sidhu should be fine either way if he is true to one of his sayings: “Politics is not a bad profession boss — if you succeed there are rewards, if you fail you can always write the book.”
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not