Faraway in a Dubai stadium, a cricket tournament — organised by aficionados from Kashmir and live-streamed on social media with score card ticking in real time on an Android app — is fast becoming a game-changer for the Valley’s unemployed and budding cricketers.
Every Friday, a weekly-off in the United Arab Emirates Dubai, 14 teams, comprising 224 cricketers from the Valley, get together at the Ajman Oval stadium, 30 km away from Dubai city, to play under the lights. A self-sponsored tournament, Kashmir Super League (KSL), is becoming a big hit back home for different reasons.
At least 52 unemployed Kashmiri youths on a visitor visa in Dubai secured jobs because of the tournament that started in the first week of January this year.
Employment chances
“The idea behind the KSL was to bond and connect with each other. There is phenomenal rise in number of Kashmiris working in Dubai. We pooled our resources to ensure that deserving youth is absorbed in different fields. The tournament helped in that,” Zubair Shah, an IT company engineer and a player of the Buhrikadal Badshah, told The Hindu on the phone from Dubai.
Most players in the KSL come from banking, construction and hotel industry.
“The tournament is providing a new platform for people who come from J&K,” said Mr. Shah.
Organised on the pattern of the Indian Premier League (IPL), of the 51 matches scheduled, 13 have already been played, with the finals to be held on March 24.
Impressed by the organisers’ use of technology, including live KSL app for Android and streaming on social networking sites, Pervaiz Rasool, who debuted for Indian team on June 15, 2014, sees in it a ray of hope for budding cricketers in the Valley. “It’s an impressive tournament. I have suggested to the KSL to have two cricketing talents, who otherwise cannot afford it, to play in each team for this kind of exposure. They are working on it,” said Mr. Rasool, an all-rounder, who also played in the IPL for Sunrisers Hyderabad.
Mr. Rasool went to Dubai to inaugurate the tournament.
Preserving culture
The tournament aims to preserve the Kashmir culture too. “We named the teams after many forgotten bridges in the Valley,” said Mr. Shah.
Teams are also named Dachigam Hangul, after an endangered Kashmiri stag, Hokarsar Rangers after the fast-shrinking wetland, and Kanqah Hamdans, after an oldest shrine.