My friends, my Gods

When every God is in your WhatsApp group

When Neeraj Chopra was hurling the javelin at the Glasgow Commonwealth Games, I hailed out to Balasubramaniam. When he attempts a gold at the Nagoya Asian Games next month, I will have Ramasubramaniam on my lips.

I don’t know when it began. Perhaps on that unforgettable June afternoon in 1983 when India stood on the brink of creating cricketing history. The tension was unbearable. Instead of saying, “Oh God,” I heard myself whisper, “Sadasivan… don’t let this slip.”

India won. Whether it was coincidence or faith, I never bothered to find out. I only knew that the next time sport tied my stomach into knots, another name escaped my lips. “Hariharan…”, “John…”, “Lakshmi…” Over the years, it became my own little superstition.

When PT Usha missed an Olympic medal by a hair’s breadth in 1984, I remember pleading with Kailasanathan. As Maradona weaved his way past defenders in Mexico, it was Mani who came to mind. Leander Paes, Viswanathan Anand, Sachin Tendulkar’s Desert Storm, Anil Kumble chasing his tenth wicket, Rajyavardhan Rathore calling for one more perfect shot, Abhinav Bindra taking aim for Olympic gold…each moment found me searching for a different name.

Sometimes it was “Come on, Esmail…”, or “Please, Shakti…” or, “Not this time, Varghese…”

When Dhoni launched that six into the Mumbai night, I have no idea whose name I uttered first. Perhaps Mathew. Perhaps Somnath. Perhaps Thyagarajan. During Neeraj Chopra’s run-up, it could have been Ramakrishnan. When PV Sindhu stretched for an impossible return, maybe it was Jayaprakash. Football World Cups, Wimbledon finals, hockey shootouts, chess championships, Olympic arenas – every sporting heartbeat somehow found a different name waiting inside me.

There was never a pattern. Unnikrishnan would appear one day, Anwar the next. Sriram during one nail-biting finish, Shaukat during another. The names arrived before the prayer did. 

None of those names belonged to Gods we worship in temples, churches or mosques. They belonged to my schoolmates who had quietly walked into my life more than half a century back and never really walked out.

Somewhere between shared lunches, borrowed notebooks, endless conversations, childhood games and grown-up responsibilities, their names had become my vocabulary of hope.

I wasn’t praying to them. I was praying through them.

Even today, when a match hangs by a thread and my pulse begins to race, I know another name will arrive uninvited. It could be Lakshmi or John. Esmail or Hariharan. Mathew or Sadasivan. Anwar or Varghese. Mani, Shakti, Somnath, Kailasanathan, Sriram, Thyagarajan, Unnikrishnan, Ramakrishnan, Jayaprakash or Shaukat.

I never choose. My heart does. My faith is not in monuments or rituals, but in the names of people who unknowingly have become my strength.

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