Covering cricket, bridging nations: A Pakistani journalist’s journey through the ICC World Cup 2023

It has been decade-long dream to cover big sporting events; it’s what drove me to become a sports journalist. Visiting India too had always been on my bucket list, especially due to my ancestral roots. Both these things coming together made it all the more exhilarating.

For Pakistani journalists, this World Cup had been a ‘Will we? Won’t we?’ question from the start. The schedule of the tournament was announced just three months before it was set to begin and media accreditations confirmed just a month before. For anyone wondering — that is very little time to prepare for an event as big as the ICC World Cup.

Then I heard the news of fellow accredited journalists being turned away from the Visa Dropbox offices and being told that only a go-ahead from the Indian High Commission would allow them to continue processing the visa — which takes at least 40 days.

With no communication even after the World Cup had started, most of those journalists, myself included, had given up. But the call I had just received had changed everything. I asked around if my fellow journalists from other media houses had also received the call. It turned out some of them had. A few television channels also started running tickers about Pakistani journalists finally being invited to apply for visas.

The call came on a Tuesday, and I was looking at the possibility of being in India to watch the hosts take on Pakistan in Ahmedabad. Travel arrangements were made in haste and packing was basically me spilling my wardrobe into a suitcase. The next morning, I was standing outside the Indian High Commission in Islamabad, under the bright sun and crisp breeze, a perfect encapsulation of the uncertainty that we were facing.

After an hour of waiting outside, I and two other colleagues were allowed inside the embassy, where we were verbally told that we were most likely going to India. However, until I received my passport with the visa stamp, it was hard to really believe it.

The next day, there it was, my first-ever visa stamp with permission to visit five cities. India was happening!

The emotions came all at once — anxiety, stress, happiness, excitement and even fear — considering the political tensions between Pakistan and India. But I was not going to let all those feelings get in the way of what was to come; they were to be deferred to another day when I would have enough time to address them.

We travelled to Lahore that very night. A short nap was all I could manage before heading to the Wagah Border, from where we were to enter India via Attari.

The last time I visited Wagah was in my adolescent years to see the daily flag-hoisting ceremony. I remember being fascinated by how a single line separated two countries; how a step here or there would mean standing in different territories.

As I proceeded towards the Zero Line after a smooth immigration process on the Pakistan side, I felt goosebumps on my arms and my eyes getting watery. Gratitude, in its purest form, took over. I was seeing my dream come true.

I couldn’t stop smiling as I stepped forward and looked back at Pakistan. Thankfully, the immigration process on the Indian side went smooth as well. A jovial Sardar Jee drove us to the Amritsar airport as we exchanged friendly banter over the India-Pakistan cricket rivalry. It seemed to be all that was important on both sides of the border those days.

From Amritsar, we flew to Ahmedabad via Delhi. From the looks of it, it felt like everyone was headed to attend the most anticipated clash of the World Cup. Throughout the flight, all I could hear were conversations about cricket — that didn’t change after the flight either. I also met two Indian expats who came all the way from Australia, specifically to watch the India-Pakistan match.

Driving by the Sabarmati River in a taxi, I reached Mirzapur, a Muslim-dominated neighbourhood in Old Ahmedabad, which was also home to the hotel I would go on to stay in for two nights later.

In Mirzapur, I was received by a distant relative, Turab and his friend, Ali Raza. They couldn’t wait to take me out to have bheja (brain) and kaleji (liver) in the older parts of the city, which resembled the old parts of Karachi quite a bit. The people speaking Gujarati around me made me feel as if I were on the streets of Kharadar or Soldier Bazaar in my hometown, Karachi.

The next morning, when it was all set to go down, I took a rickshaw to the media shuttle pick-up point. Varadbhai, the rickshaw driver manoeuvred past Indian fans clad in blue jerseys on the road. Many of them had travelled from all parts of the country. Varadbhai was delighted to hear that I was from Pakistan and excitedly shared that his grandfather too was from Karachi.

I had breakfast at the Lucky Hotel with Turab in the little time I had before my flight the next morning.

From Ahmadabad, I had a four-hour layover in Chennai — the city my ancestors come from and where my maternal aunt still resides. Making the most of my layover, I met her after seven long years and in those few hours, we managed to have street food and masala dosa near the airport.

An hour later, I was in Bangalore. Compared to Ahmedabad’s hot and dry weather, Bangalore was cool and pleasant. After a day of much-needed rest, I went out for some tourist excursions — the Cubbon Park and the Vidhana Soudha, the largest legislative building in India, spread over 60 acres of land.

Both sites were close to the M Chinnaswamy Stadium, where Pakistan was scheduled to play Australia two days later. The Chinnaswamy ground has hosted some of the most memorable Pakistan-India matches.

I covered the team practice held in the stadium that evening. I also met India’s 1983 World Cup-winning wicket-keeper Syed Kirmani, who was kind enough to let me interview him, while also offering me South Indian classics — spicy Idli and filter coffee from Karnataka.

That day I also met Sandeep Gopal, a cricket writer from the Indian Express newspaper. Gopal helped me shake off my nerves before I interviewed Kirmani and for me, that was enough to consider him as another friend in what I was finding to be a vibrant, lively country.

After the pre-match press conference coverage, I took a stroll down the famous Church Street, the hub of Bangalore’s nightlife in search of a bookstore. Somewhat contradictory? Perhaps it was.

I was looking for a book which a friend back home had asked me to get due to its unavailability in Pakistan. I came across the Blossom Book House, located just in the midst of the Church Street area. Coming from Pakistan, just seeing huge bookstores themselves was quite amusing.

While I was getting familiar with Bangalore, Pakistan seemed to be getting more and more unfamiliar with winning. In what I can only describe as a terrible fielding performance, we lost to Australia by 63 runs.

The next match was to be held in Chennai, where Pakistan had an exceptional track record so far. I took the four-hour-long Vande Bharat Express speed train. This time I was received by my aunt’s son, my first cousin.

From the very first day, Chennai felt like home. I knew a week here would never be enough but it was all I could manage between work and family. Despite being told by many in Bangalore about Chennai’s irritable humidity, it did not bother me much, perhaps owing to Karachi’s own humid, coastal weather. In fact, to me, the weather seemed rather pleasant. Chennai’s air had a sense of calm — the main roads were wide and spacious, and the people were welcoming and warm.

Pakistan was to play Afghanistan and South Africa in the coming week in the MA Chidambaram Stadium — commonly known as Chepauk. The stadium felt like a representation of Chennai through its simple yet visually appealing architecture. The white conical roofs of the stands made it my favourite venue in India.