An edited version was published in The Indian Express on April 3, 2011.
Chinki Sinha
New Delhi, April 2, 2011
His eyes shut, he bent down, gathered the tricolor that had fallen off the stick and kissed it fervently. It was ecstasy. Pure, unbridled joy.
And then he ran along the streets, wrapped in the flag, beaming with pride until he hit the barricades.
He was just one of the thousands of revelers that came out on the streets to celebrate India's win tonight. They were all headed to India Gate.
India Gate had become a pilgrimage of sorts. Everyone headed there just after the victory was confirmed.
They came from all sides like rivers trying to make it to the sea, vying to get to the host sooner than the other.
But the waves hit the barricades, and then turned inwards like a tsunami. That's how the revelries began the night India won the cup. Anger was overcome by happiness. The revelers forgave the police on duty, shook hands with them, even embraced them and obeyed. By then, the rivers had rolled backwards, and the city was flooding all over – with cheer, with love, with patriotism.
When Dhoni hit the ball and the ball rose high in the air, Baljeet Singh, the traffic personnel on duty at India Gate, knew the calm wouldn't last for long. The storm was coming. Tonight, they weren't going to let anyone come near the monument. Two days ago, when India beat Pakistan in Mohali, crowds had descended at India Gate. Women danced on streets, cars were stopped, traffic was disrupted.
Extra police force had been called in this time. Men in uniform stood guard in anticipation. They were nervous, too.
It was always tough to contain emotion. Almost three decades later, India had brought home the coveted cup.
Before then, the streets wore an eerie look. Then, the streets began to move.
The first revelers were politely asked to divert.
Then, the battle cries erupted. Bare chest men ran through the streets, holding the Tri-color. They didn't get past the barricades. But so what. They stood there, and danced. Even UPA chief Sonia Gandhi came out, and celebrated on the streets.
She sat in the car window like others, and waved and smiled.
Cars moved along slowly, their trunks open and music filled the streets of the national capital. Bhangra mixed with trance.
The emotion was potent, infectious.
The streets got a life of their own.
It was a moving celebration.
“We will break through these barricades to get there eventually. We will do it somehow. We must be allowed to express our happiness. We just want to celebrate,” Kedar Singh, a Bikaner House resident, said. He had come out on the streets to mingle with those who felt one with the victory.
The Shahjahan Road was choked with cars, all moving slowly. Young men leaped out of the car windows, and shouted. They hugged strangers, and held hands.
Even the policemen were smiling. They were humans, too. They had been calling their families and checking up on scores all through the evening. This was their celebration, too.
The atmosphere was heady. Car trunks opened, and Chak De India played. Men broke into a frantic dancing. All the while, they were moving away from the monument that looked solemn, devoid of the cheer that surrounded it.
Virendar Singh was shooting the scene on his mobile phone. He was preserving the moment. This was his first World Cup moment. The frenzy was what got to him. He wanted to capture it all.
“This is some memory I want to keep,” he said. “Look at this. I have never seen anything like this. It is like the city is erupting in some ecstasy.”
Then the ground underneath began to reverberate. A few cars had stopped. Music, a medley of songs blasted. Woofers were turned at their full.
That's when you know victory is ours. That's when the ground begins to shake, another man said. He said “congratulations” and walked away.
Tourist buses came, laden with gawking foreigners who peered out of the glass windows to see the cheer on the roads. Bikers had converged at the same place, the point where everyone had to turn inwards. It was like taking a U-turn after glimpsing the monument. It was at the U-turn that the strangers converged, and laughed, and danced before they moved on to make way for others.
Across from the monument, a man stood between two policemen and shouted "Bharat Mata Ki Kai." Another man clicked him. The policemen laughed.
This was a riot of a different kind. The adrenaline flowed freely, and spared nobody.
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