The Big Career Game
Let Game be the Career....You make money in pursuing your passion
The era of 1970-80s saw rise of Engineering as a career. With IITs playing a glamorous sibling ever since then, the desire to see your ward cracking IITs still continues to rule the roost. Coupled with that, there is also a fanatic desire for engineering, and IITians among them the most, to break into IIMs, and then you are assured of a career which takes you places, allows you to rub shoulders with the best , and then there isn't anything stopping you.
The era of 1990s saw the craze building up for Doctors, and, after Engineering, a degree in MBBS still continues to lure a good segment of young students since then, who takes pride in being called Doctors - MBBS. MD and so on. Nonetheless, a course in MBBS is quite strenuous, and when you do succeed finally, after qualifying in NEET exam (of late it is beset with lot of reservation and political compulsions), it takes lot of time to get the feeling of being settled in life. The White Coat you wear and a stethoscope in the neck and people calling you Doctor is the only pride you live with; the money part in this profession continuing to be abysmally low; more so when you compare yourself with those students who opted for Engineering during your times, and you find them now calling the shots.
The career in Accountancy, such as CA, CS and ICWA, and of late Legal, generally gets pursued by students who opt for Commerce or Arts and have some flair of numbers, and even those among engineering and medicine who couldn't make it to their choicest place, and the big gap in career market is being filled up by this lot.
This desire to pursue a career in engineering (includes IT and allied fields), medicines, accountancy and law has spun a host of coaching institutes all over India, especially Kota, Hyderabad, Chennai, Pune, Bangalore and other major metros, and every other student is flocking to these training institutes, as they sell dreams, by aggressively bombarding their respective, purported accomplishments, through Newspapers advt. Few students make career out of these Coaching institutes, and the rest help give fillip to career of such Coaching institutes.
Of late, the buzz in sports arena, and especially in the game of Cricket, has reached an enviable level, and promises assured career, while allowing you to pursue your passion. While getting to don Indian colors at the highest level is ultimate dream of every budding player, but even the fringe player now-a-days too command a decent purse, thanks to advent of IPL, and they can look forward, with optimism , to a great career. Even if a career in Sports generally, apparently, appear to have limited life span, and may sound like a dampener, but the kind of money game of cricket promises is unfathomable, with future coaching assignments up sleeves of promising players.
The transition of game of cricket from Test Match (with which the game was originally and traditionally associated with) into ODIs, and then T20s, and later glamorized into IPL in the year 2008, has opened up the canvass to unimaginable levels, like Fantasy Cricket Apps Dream 11, MPL, Vision11 and others alike bombarding the small screen and Bill Boards all over the mega city and trying to take slice of viewer's purse.
Of late, on the lines of IPL, some states too have started regional IPLs like, Karnataka, Kerala and Tamil Nadu etc. Delhi in fact has gone a step ahead in introducing intra-segment tournament in East Delhi, being sponsored by an ex stalwart of the game Gautam Gambhir. With introduction of two more teams at national level in IPL, viz, Ahmadabad and Lucknow (total 10 teams now from 2022 onward), huge opportunities have been unleashed for both budding cricketers, and retired cricketers alike in managerial roles, and remember, the buck doesn't appear to be stopping so soon.
True, they say that there is huge competition in all sports, and more so in the game of cricket, and survival is a real issue, but then so is true for IIT, IIM, MBBS and CA etc too. But then, it is competition alone which spurs everyone in the game, be it academic or sports, put-forth their best, rather keep innovating to go a notch above the best of best. Secondly, pursuing sports as a career lets one pursue one's passion and make money out of their passion too, In most of other careers, since money-making is the priority for everyone, most of us sacrifice or compromise on our passion while we pursue our careers for money and position.
Amazingly, the big wonder is that even if India fails at the international sporting events, and doesn't do as well as expected, like, we lost the Cricket World Test Championship to NewZeland, were comprehensively beaten and eliminated at the last T20 Championship, lost the Test series and ODI series in South Africa, the craze for the game continues to blaze unhindered and appears to have gone into our bones, and we just can't get rid of that frenzy. The game of cricket, with Kohli or no Kohli, with MSD, or no MSD, shall continue to catch our eyeballs, shall remain favorite topic of gossip in any casual get together or any meetings and shall continue to entertain audience, next only to Bollywood.
VISION AHEAD
The day is not far off when you see cricket universities sprouting all over the country to develop young enthusiasts a disciplined course in the game of cricket, and may be for other sports too, as we see commercialization of Kabaddi, Football, Badminton etc too. Some entrepreneur may go even to school level also to catch the budding players at the formative stage itself. It's just a matter of time when some visionary pioneer of game shall start an inter- colony, inter-society (gated communities , like in Bangalore, Mumbai, Chennai, Hyderabad, Gurgaon, to name a few) tournament in every mega city (which eventually shall go down to Tier II cities too) to keep the flame alive throughout the year. In fact, the craze for the game is so much that you can stretch the canvass to any extent you can envision.
Shortly, you may find a dedicated channel for cricket on TV, like Cricbuzz , talk shows with celebrated players, which shall keep telecasting various iconic matches on TV 24/7, have a live competition on TV on knowledge about cricket, players and cricket matches, introduce Playing cards on the lines we had for WWF etc., and I believe there is a dedicated audience for the same, and as on date, there appears to be no chance of that craze fading down in foreseeable future.
The game of cricket, with unabated success of IPLs, and massive crowd of spectators it brings to stadium, has gone beyond the game, and it has more become a kind of festival in India. Cricket has become a religion here in India, and mind it there is no going back on that.
I hope parents and children alike, would have started noticing the changing trends in career opportunities, and they shall think of looking beyond routine graduation/post-graduation courses, and shall rather see the interests of their children, or may be help them pursue a rewarding career in Sports, like Ande Aggasi in Lawn Tennis, and Pandya and Chahar Brothers in the game of cricket, and guide them pursue something they are passionate about.
I hope, Modis, Kunals, Shahs, Bhatias, Agarwals, Binnis and alike, are smelling the opportunities, sports in general and cricket in particular, is offering and shall already be drawing a roadmap to catch on the irreversible fever.