Number 38.

38 seem to be a number that always keeps hovering around me.  For 2 reasons, one being that my building number is that and 2^nd that it being my waist size. The latter, will reduce soon (Hopefully) 

I always thought that the day Sachin Tendulkar announces his retirement from the game of cricket would be the day where I would feel really sad (or even cry). But when Rahul Dravid finally decided to retire before Sachin, that feeling of being sad just got the better of me.

Not to deny, I have always been a Sachin fan and still believes that Indian cricket runs because of him (I know many would agree and few wouldn’t) But, if there was one person who commanded respect it had to be Rahul Sharad Dravid. 

Have been reading a few articles by Ayaz Memon, Harsha Bhogle, VVS Laxman where they all mentioned one thing in common, that Rahul called us and informed us on the decision that he has taken and would like to thank them for their support all through these years. 16 years of cricket and still the same amount of respect for the observers of the game and colleagues is really incredible. 

Holding a record that anyone would die for, he has probably been an incredible ambassador not only for the game of cricket in India, but internationally. 

Come to think off it, in filmy terms Dravid has always been the ‘Best Supporting Actor’, the man who might have played the best role, but somehow lands up being the second lead, always.  The guy who’s life has always been spent in shadows.  

The Test debut at Lords where he made a sparkling 95 at Lord's in 1996, we also had Sourav Ganguly, scoring a 131. A dehydrated Dravid batted all day long against Australia at Kolkata in 2001, where he scored 180, we had VVS Laxman who also batted all day and made a gritting 281. 

And coming down to the recent tour of England where Dravid scored these 3 superb centuries in England , but they weren’t counted much as we all were waiting for the Master Tendulkar to score his 100th hundred.

Dravid was also a selfless team man, and we could see that in the way he has contributed towards the team. 

He batted everywhere from No1 to 7 in the Test team including the famous Kolkata Test , where he batted at No.6 From what I have read he dint quite like keeping the wickets but played 73 one-day internationals as a wicketkeeper to give the team that balance, this also included the 2003 World Cup. 

As Harsha Bhogle puts it “Rahul Dravid batted exactly like the person he is: stately and upright, dignity and poise his two shoulders, standing up to everything coming at him with minimum fuss. He picked his shots carefully, almost like he was weighing the risk for fear of letting himself and his side down. There was little about him that was flamboyant - there isn't with an oak - and patiently, brick by brick, he built giant edifices. He is a good man and he batted like a good man” 

The wall, Mr. Dependable, etc we would still be short of adjectives to describe his greatness. 

No. 3 will never be the same again.

Respect!

The 2012 UP elections was something that was spoken and discussed by many. Some even said these elections would draw the battle lines for the 2014 General Elections. And from what it looks, things are heating up already. 

If there was one hero of these elections it had to be Akhilesh Yadav, the young Samajwadi Party (SP) leader, who has turned the electoral tide in Uttar Pradesh elections into a huge SP win, something that his Congress counterpart Rahul Gandhi had hoped to do when he had chosen UP as his make-or-break battleground a couple of years back. 

A Bachelor of Engineering (BE) degree .He also holds a Masters in environmental engineering from Sydney University as well. His journey into the political world started when he was elected to the Lok Sabha from Kannauj in a by-election in the year 2000. Since then he has been around and trying to learn the political tricks from his dad. 

So what were the factors that really worked for this young man? 

Akhilesh became a complete grass root worker on one hand, covering the length and breadth of the state to reach out to the voters and workers and to increase the support base, on the other hand came promises of free laptops to students on the eve of the 2012 Assembly polls. 

In comparison to Rahul Gandhi's negative campaign which spoke about the injustice meted out to the state's people, Akhilesh’s scheme of ‘free laptop' promise brought about a fresh change from the usual. 

The Congress spoke about reservations for Muslims. Akhilesh spoke about Urdu keyboards. He also tried to keep the candidates with criminal record at bay. 

Also, the post- Amar Singh era in the party saw a change. Akhilesh ensured that there was no movie star, no corporate houses or no shoo-shaa from Mumbai that dominated this election. 

In the 400-odd meetings that he had conducted he ensured that there was more of conversation than speeches.  On the other hand, Rahul Gandhi was in a mood to be ‘The Angry Young Man’. 

When Akhilesh was asked why did the Congress fail? He said ‘One leader worked very hard in the Congress. But other big leaders harmed the Congress’ 

With the journey just started for this young leader, there would be a lot of expectations from him in the coming 5 years.

Why the post is called No. 38? 

And why have I featured 2 people in the same post, and that too who don’t have anything common? 

Nothing great just that at 38, Rahul Dravid ends his career and Akhilesh Singh is on the verge of starting his.