India required another 5 runs from 11 balls to be crowned world champions. Dhoni took strike as Nuwan Kulasekara, with the look of a deer caught in the headlights, began his run up. A nation held its breath. Would Dhoni finish it off in style? “We want sixer, we want sixer,” the crazed crowd in the Wankhede began to chant. “Could this be it?” Shastri’s all too familiar and strangely reassuring voice wafted through the drawing rooms of millions of households
It was a fullish delivery and Dhoni picked up its line and length early, getting into perfect position to smite it over long-off. He was one swing away from etching his team’s name in the pantheon of greatness. Heady adulation would follow; endorsements running into crores would be his for the taking; a grateful people would bend over backwards to fete him for decades. Nothing succeeds like success, and he was determined to taste it.
Dhoni pushed out these distracting thoughts to pick up the ball and caught Kulasekara’s eyes, disappointment and fear writ large in them. And then he began to hesitate, his vice like grip over his 3 pound bat, which he wielded like a medieval warrior scything his enemies with a sword, began to loosen; his legs began to shiver and his mind began to waver.
The noise suddenly began to dissipate, the throng in the stadium reducing itself to specks against a deep dark background; “Is this all worth it?” his inner voice assailed him. “You tonk this ball, the crowds cheer lustily, their atavistic passions quenched. And what after that?” his inner voice mocked and Dhoni blinked.
Everything now appeared still, frozen in time in that transcendental moment of contemplation. And then he saw a similar visage, resplendent in His cosmic glory, against the ink black sky of that early spring night.
“Hae player of the Helicopter shot, why this hesitancy? Why are you gripped by the icy cold hands of weakness?” Sachin asked, appearing in front of him. “Such despair does not befit you. Go through with your shot, Do you duty.”
“Hae God of cricket,” MSD said, voice now quaking. “My will has deserted me, plagued as I am by self-doubt. What is the meaning of all this? Why is winning so important? If I win, some one loses. Is this even worth it? Look at that poor Kulasekara there. I have bludgeoned his bowling mercilessly and now he in his follow through he beseeches me to deliver the coup de grace swiftly and put him out of his mercy. I ..I cannot do this, hae Master.”
“You are but an instrument in His hands, hae Mahendra. It is not for you to contemplate outcomes but just do your duty. And your duty right now is to smash this ball out of the stadium. For to do your duty dispassionately without caring about the consequences is to realize the supreme truth.”
“You depress me even more, O Sachin. If I stop caring about results, statistics then where will be the will to excel, the desire to compete? Please guide me on this, hae Master.”
“There are 4 types of cricketers, O Murari of slog overs: those who play the game for the love of it, those who play it for the love of statistics and records, and then those who play it to win and cavort with the accompanying impostors, transient fame and material gain. But only those who play it with a sense of even mindedness, knowing that it is merely another path to salvation, it is these karmayogis who achieve true enlightenment.”
“Hae bhagwaan, you yourself were an exemplar of the first three types, weren’t you? Going after that silly 100th 100, playing the game simply because you loved it, breaking down if India lost…” Dhoni asked, inducing a smirk from the divine one.”
“I have to set the example, the benchmarks for mere mortals to follow, he finisher of games. For if I don’t, then mankind will sink into indolence, enterprise will cease to a grinding halt, and civilization itself will begin to wilt.”
“Is what they say about you true, hae Sachin? That you are the supreme godhead?” Dhoni asked, the colour returning to his face.
“Indeed, hae skipper of CSK. I am indivisible and eternal. I am omnipresent, omniscient, and omnipotent. I am timeless. I am without an ending, I am without a beginning,” the God of cricket said and revealed his true form to the trembling Indian skipper.
All doubts began to melt away in Dhoni’s mind. “I see the truth now, hae Sachin. Pleasure and pain, victory and defeat, honour and dishonour, these are but the twin impostors to be kept at an arm’s length. It is for me to act and do what I have to do. I am grateful to you, hae Sachin, for showing me the true path,” Dhoni said, the strength returning to his voice.
Sachin’s astral visage began to fade away and the deafening noise returned. The ball now appeared more clearly against a backdrop of humanity, hurtling towards him. Dhoni strengthened his grip, his forearms straining, as he swung his bat murderously to deliver a stunning impulse to the white object.
“AND THAT’S GONE LIKE A TRACER BULLET,” Shastri’s voice boomed. “Ladies and Gentleman, India are the World Cup Champions.”
Watching the ball fly out the stadium, Dhoni murmured, “I have done my duty, hae God of cricket, as you advised,” twirling his bat in the follow-through.