Cricket captain Virat Kohli speaks up for India

Kohli courageously breaks the deafening silence of Indian celebrity culture

Indian cricket team captain Virat Kohli being interviewed in Dubai on Oct. 21, 2021. Via Getty

Less than a week ago I wrote a piece on this Substack criticizing the Indian cricket team for its hypocrisy in taking the knee for Black lives in America but remaining silent about atrocities by the Indian government, the public attacks on the Indian minorities, and the alleged murder of farmers by the son of the Junior Home Minister of India. I have felt a deep frustration over the hypocrisy of our celebrity culture: Its public figures have consistently looked the other way as the Indian state, led by Prime Minister Modi, has fallen into an authoritarianism with few parallels in our history. Indian cricketer Mohd Shami was mercilessly hounded by nationalists after India was routed by Pakistan in the debut match of the T20 world cup; his teammates were happy to kneel for Americans thousands of miles away, but not to stand with him while nationalists accused him of throwing the game to Pakistan because he is a Muslim. Three days ago, sedition charges were invoked against Kashmiri students who cheered for the Pakistan cricket team. You read that right. Sedition.

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It is therefore essential to laud Indian cricket team captain Virat Kohli for his courage in coming down heavily on the spineless trolls who attacked his teammate. “There’s a good reason why we are playing on the field and not a bunch of spineless people on social media that have no courage to actually speak to any individual in person.. It has become a social pandemic in today’s world, which is so unfortunate and so sad to see because this is literally the lowest level of human potential that one can operate at,”  Kohli said at a press conference on October 30. “And that’s how I look at these people. Attacking someone over their religion is the most pathetic thing that a human being can do. They have no understanding of how much effort we put on the field. They have no understanding of the fact that someone like Shami has won India matches in the last few years. Honestly I don’t even want to waste one minute of my life to give any attention to those people and neither does Shami and neither does anyone else on the team.”

Many well-meaning Indians said that this statement should not be celebrated as an act of bravado and that Kohli’s statement was too little, too late in the day—the bare minimum that we should expect of any Indian public figure. I do understand the frustration underlying the cynicism, but I would beg to differ. Speaking the bare minimum, as Kohli has done, is now an act of rebellion against religious polarisation, bigotry and the culture of hate. Kohli’s statement must be seen in the context of the arrest of Aryan Khan, the son of India’s biggest superstar, Shah Rukh Khan—a global icon, in many ways India’s cultural ambassador to the world. Yet the clearly political arrest of Aryan elicited protest from shamefully few of his powerful friends. A source close to the actor told me that he was inundated with private texts and calls—but no one was willing to speak about his persecution in public, not even those in his inner circle. Indian filmmaker Sanjay Gupta, a rare exception, tweeted out in frustration “Shahrukh Khan has and continues to give jobs and livelihoods to thousands in the film industry. He has always stood up for every cause for the film industry. And the astute silence of the same film industry in his moment of crisis is nothing short of SHAMEFUL.”

According to my own sources, Gupta’s sentiments echoed among well-meaning friends from the film fraternity in India, who forwarded the tweet to one another but were too scared to say a word in public. When news channels invited members of the film industry and other cultural icons to appear on their show to express solidarity with the superstar, most of them—who can usually be found rehearsing lines scripted for them by the government—pretended not to notice.

The Indian cricket team has always been the heart of this country. Cricket is not just a sport, it is a religion, and the Captain of the Indian cricket team is worshipped by followers spanning generations. When Kohli speaks up, even belatedly, he is doing so bravely. Within hours of his statement, Hindu nationalists threatened to rape his ten-month-old daughter Vamika. Others wished for his death and for the Indian team to lose the series. Some blamed India’s terrible game on ‘plurality’ and ‘secularism’.  Kohli chose humanity over opportunism, and was punished. On the day Pakistan defeated India, he hugged and congratulated Pakistani players in a warm and rare gesture especially when the two countries shared an extremely frosty relationship and the cricket match was viewed from the skewed prism of patriotism. 

The Indian cricket team may be playing badly in match after match of this World Cup, but I, like many Indians, am rooting for this captain and his team. They have backbones, and they have basic humanity—something crucial to an India drowning in a culture of hate and servility. Well done, captain Kohli!