Whether there will be anyone on the other end of the phone to take their call remains in serious doubt. Yes, the entire Indian subcontinent will be closed for business today as India take on Pakistan in the second semi-final of the World Cup .
Cellphones the world over will finally fall silent as call centres across the land are emptied of salesmen. It may not be an official national holiday but it will be a de facto day of anxious "leisure" for everyone from Kanyakumari in the South to Sost in Northern Pakistan. Well, I say everyone. If the media is to be believed there is one group of selfless individuals who, nobly and altruistically, will use the unique opportunity provided by a cricket match to solve the bitter disputes that have bedeviled Indo-Pak relations for 54 years. Apparently delegations from the Home Offices of both countries have been working round the clock in the days leading up to the match to thrash out a series of agreements that Prime Ministers Yousuf Raza Gilani and Manmohan Singh can rubber stamp after a gentle, civilized day at the cricket.
There is even talk of a limited prisoner exchange. But can it really be that half acentury of rivalry is about to be replaced so easily by a fraternal accord that will usher in a bright new dawn? Let us examine the entrenched positions of both sides. In the Green corner sits Gilani. For the best part of 30 years now his men have stuck to a rigid and unshakable faith in the power of reverse swing bowling, backed up by explosive, ludicrously gifted, but entirely unpredictable batsmen . Frequently Pathans from the unruly mountain districts of Pakistan, they have terrorized players around the world with their unfathomable methods and weapons of rapid wicket taking ability, even on the slow, low surfaces of India.
Suspecting that they were falling behind in this arms race to control the middle overs of a One Day International, the Indians began developing their own retaliatory response at the turn of the century in the shape of Zaheer Khan. He is now fully tested and at the height of his destructive powers. But he sits alone within the Indian arsenal as sadly later models, such as the Sreesanth, the Munaf Patel and most especially the Ashish Nehra have been fitted with faulty stump tracking radar. It's , therefore, hard to see the Indians agreeing to lay down their Zaheer Khan without demanding the decommissioning of both Umar Gul and Wahab Riaz. Even then hardliners in Singh's cabinet are unlikely to rest until the currently mothballed Shoaib Akhtar is included in a fully comprehensive disarmament proposal.
Fortunately both PMs can find common ground on the use of spinners with each side sporting models that claim to be 31 years old. Suspicions remain in India that Shaheed Afridi was developed a good four years before his off spinning counterpart Harbhajan Singh, and that he has also been fitted with vastly improved wrists since his last outing in a World Cup, but hopes remain high that this won't constitute an irreconcilable stumbling block to negotiations, in part because India have finally unveiled their own spin bowling upgrade in the shape of Ravichandran Ashwin. Ashwin has recently replaced Piyush Chawla who has been sent back to the manufacturer to fix what is hoped to be only a temporary malfunction whereby every ball he bowls lacks guile or the slightest threat.
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