Front pages from the morning after the big night

BELLUR RAMAKRISHNA forwards a collage of today’s newspaper from heralding India’s magnificent triumph in the 2011 cricket World Cup (click on the image for a larger view). You can see an assemblage of English, Hindi, Telugu, Malayalam, Tamil and Kannada newspapers, and the odd Sri Lankan paper.

If nearly 60% of the country is below 25 years of age, the collage is a reminder of what 1983 was to nearly two-thirds of the country that wasn’t born when Kapil Dev and his men did ditto—in pre-liberalised India, an age before satellite television, when one-day cricket was played over 60 overs.

Pradeep Vijayakar, a Times man till death: RIP

sans serif records the demise of Pradeep Vijayakar, the longtime sports correspondent of The Times of India, on Saturday, 1 January 2011.

Vijayakar had been suffering from cancer of the pancreas and had been ailing for some time. He would have turned 60 in five days’ time.

Vijayakar, who started his career with Sportsweek, had been with The Times of India since 1975 and has been quoted as saying that he would work with the paper till his death.

A legspinner who played with batting legend Sunil Gavaskar for St. Xavier’s college, Vijayakar was known for his diligence be it in covering an international cricket fixture, a local hockey match or a school event.

He shared a birthday with another famous Indian cricket legend, Kapil Dev.

“He would always be the first to wish me. I spoke to Pradeep two days ago, and he said he’d be alright soon and ‘we’ll meet again’. That couldn’t happen,” said Kapil Dev.

“In our time, players and journalists were like friends; he was always around.”

The Times of India ran a tribute on its sports pages and an advertisement (above) appeared on the classified pages in Bombay.

In a tribute in Mid-Day, the veteran sports writer Ayaz Memon wrote:

“As a department colleague during my stint with the Times of India, Pradeep would often talk of his joys at reporting little-known matches, spotting and encouraging young talent. “This is the stage at which sport is at its cleanest and most enjoyable,” he would say.

“Pradeep was a terrific raconteur, a prankster, fond of ghazals and old songs which he would croon with the seriousness of a professional playback singer. He was also fond of collecting memorabilia,including for some reason which I was never able to fathom, match-boxes from all over the world.”

Photograph: courtesy The Times of India

Also read: Ayaz Memon on Pradeep Vijayakar

Gandhi for the goose ain’t Gandhi for the gander?

Mail Today, the tabloid newspaper published by the India Today group, has launched a smart print and outdoor campaign in New Delhi.

With the tagline “The world has changed”, the campaign pits the past with the present. Kapil Dev, in his classic bowling action, but with cheer girls in the background. The new maharaja of the air, not the Air-India one but the king of good times, Vijay Mallya. And so on.

But it’s the ad featuring Mahatma Gandhi with Congress leader Rahul Gandhi that has set tongues wagging.

Reason: only last week, editor-at-large S. Prasannarajan had nibbled at the styluses of “professional panegyrists” and “sundry mythmakers from the media” who had canonised the new Mrs G (Sonia Gandhi) as better and brighter than the old Mrs G (Indira Gandhi), a barely disguised barb at competitor Outlook* which had a recent cover on Sonia titled “Smarter than Indira“.

So, juxtaposing Mr G with the real Mr G is OK, but juxtaposing Mrs G with Mrs G is not?

Image: courtesy Mail Today

* Disclosures apply!