Cricket fans pose with their bodies in the colors of the Indian and Pakistani national flags before the first match between India and Pakistan in the Super 12 round of the T20 World Cup in Dubai, India on October 23, 2021. REUTERS
The event will see millions of people around the world watch television in remote villages, jumbo screens in crowded cities, telephones in migrant workers' tenements and shiny monitors in diaspora lounges around the world.
Face-to-face clashes between India and Pakistan on the cricket field have become increasingly rare as expected in Dubai on Sunday, with two nuclear-armed neighbors suffering due to ice ties. For a match to be held, even on a neutral ground, players and fans must expect that the tension will be less fought and the organizers can weather the growing call for a boycott.
Sunday's meeting, for the first time in two years, comes as part of the World Cup. Rising tensions are linked to a number of factors - repeated militant attacks in India; The disputed region of Kashmir, where India accuses Pakistan of supporting militant groups; And the growing intolerance in both countries - which has almost completely wiped out any exchanges between two nations that otherwise overlap divided history, passion and culture.
But the intensity of the emotions surrounding Sunday's match draw is deeply rooted, a national identity issue linked to the fate of the rival cricket team.
And despite recent calls for a boycott of Indian political leaders for violence in Kashmir, the game continues. As the Indian cricket governing body has made clear, the country cannot go beyond such international commitments, especially in the T20 World Cup - where its team is in favor of winning.
"We need to maintain a cricketing bond," Pakistan Cricket Board chief Ramiz Raja said after meeting his Indian opponent. "Our position is, 'The more politics from cricket, the better.'
But in cricket, a game that can seem surprisingly obsolete to complex, it is precisely the political fault line that creates such emotional interest.
Cricket in South Asia is the legacy of British colonial rule - "an Indian game was accidentally invented by the British," as critic Ashish Nandi once said. With the end of that rule, India was divided in 1947, creating a new nation for millions of Muslims in the region.
In the 75 years since then, the two countries have gone to war several times and are on the brink of war without a war. Sometimes, tension means cricket teams haven’t played each other for a decade or more. Other times, such as the 1999 World Cup, they played a match and even fought over Kashmir.
"It's tempting to draw a parallel between the story of cricket and the story of India," Amit Verma, who hosts the popular podcast "The Scene and the Unseen", said in a recent episode. "We started uncertain about our position in the world, tried to find our feet, stuck in an inferiority complex, looking for pride for small comforts, but eventually opened up to the world and strengthened ourselves."
"Our cricket has developed so much that India dominates the game, especially in the commercial sense," Verma added.
As India has become an undisputed destination for the sport in recent years, the top players in the world want to play in the lucrative Indian Premier League. The league is among the top five most profitable sports leagues in the world and the top players can earn as much as 2 2 million in a two-month season.
But as a sign of the region's turbulent times, Pakistani players have been barred from joining the league, deprived of a great platform to compete with the best in the world - or get some resources in cash. The two countries severed bilateral ties in 2008 after a deadly terrorist attack in Mumbai by Pakistani terrorists.
The fact that games have sometimes been played only in neutral venues over a decade has removed a major vehicle of interaction between these two cricket-crazy countries.
Indian and Pakistani players often say that whenever they play in another country, the intensity of the field matches only through hospitality. Market vendors will refuse payments, where families of host players will send home-cooked meals to guest players in their hotel rooms.
"I hosted the whole Indian team at my house - kebabs and the full range of everything," recalls former Pakistan captain Shahid Afridi on a tour more than a decade ago. “When they come, I know they are all vegetarians. I was quick to shake for lentils and vegetables. "
Vicky Luthra, who runs a photo studio in New Delhi, is such a fan that she watched the India-Pakistan match four times, including the 2017 tour of England, where match tickets cost around $ 400.
"I can't draw my face, I can't do all the drama. I'm a decent spectator of cricket."
The game I remember most when I crossed the border on foot in 2006 to watch India's game in Lahore, Pakistan. He was excited to go - his grandparents came from a part of the country that ended up in Pakistan - but his wife insisted he would not let her travel alone.
"My wife was strongly opposed to going to Pakistan," Luthra said. “But he was amazed at how good it was, how friendly the people were. I got to see those parts because of cricket.
For Pakistan, too, the story of his cricket team occasionally reflects the situation in the country - an outpouring of brilliance and talent outraged by mismanagement, uncertainty and lack of opportunities.
Pakistan has been an underdog in recent years, with India setting an unbeaten World Cup record. But in the 1980s and 1990s, Pakistan had the kind of talent that could often win bilateral matches, which was heartbreaking for the huge fan following of the Indian team. The country’s current prime minister has signed up for the first time in cricket; He led Pakistan to the 1992 World Cup crown.
This year’s tournament comes at a time when Pakistan’s mood is “going down,” says their cricket chief Raja.
After the militant attack on the Sri Lankan cricket team in Lahore in 2009, Pakistan went a decade away without hosting a single international match. International teams have slowly started touring the country again. But just a few weeks before the World Cup, New Zealand abruptly canceled its tour due to security concerns and England soon followed suit.
In the Pakistani port city of Karachi, fans prepared for the T20 World Cup match in the hope that their team could eventually overturn India's dominance.
There are many formats in cricket, including "Test matches" that can last up to five days and still end in a tie. But the T20 World Cup is the shortest, each match lasts about three hours, so the results are more easily influenced by the short spelling of brightness.
Karachi-based journalist Ebad Ahmed told some fans about the divine intervention, "The Koran came out of the pocket, the holy words were memorized and hands were raised for prayer." "The idea is to bring God to our side."
Whatever the chances of the Pakistani team, the game will be a publicly shared experience even for people like Muzamil Ali, a 33-year-old sales professional who has admitted that he doesn’t even like cricket. Even so, when India and Pakistan, most people can't help but watch - and Ali plans to take it to the big screen outside.
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