From Jangipur to Jo'burg, Pranab's tryst with soccer

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s debut match for the Fifa World Cup 2010 kicks off tonight when Iberian rivals Spain and Portugal meet at the top-table encounter in Cape Town. 

Apart from being a football-crazy Bengali, what is it that prods him to take time out of his busy schedule to see a world cup match? The Finance Minister has a simple answer to it: “That’s the only sports I understand.” 

However, the veteran politician and the busiest minister at the Centre had to do some prior homework before he decided to take to the field — although Mukherjee was aware that South Africa is the host nation for this years soccer extravaganza, he enquired about the channel he would have to tune in to see the matches. “I will tell Padam (his cook for over a decade) to set ESPN on the TV set in my office room at my residence. I am eager to watch the World Cup,” he said. 

The late-night encounters would be the only time Mukherjee would have the luxury to enjoy, as it is impossible for him to watch the evening matches because of his engagements throughout the day. 

Mukherjee is not only a football fan, but has also been a mentor for the game in his own backyard: his Lok Sabha constituency. Every year, Mukherjee makes time to inaugurate the Kamada Kinkar Mukherjee Gold Cup – named after his freedom fighter father – at Jangipur. 

He had an interesting anecdote to share: during his trip to Buenos Aires as commerce and industry minister in the P V Narasimha Rao government, he was amused to see the the country’s love for football. 

“One day, my Argentine counterpart offered to take me out to lunch. We passed a park and I saw a toddler from the car trying to kick a football. The football was several times bigger than the child. Every time he tried to kick the ball he would fall down — asn if the ball kicked him back,” he said. 

“I drew the Argentine minister’s attention to this and she told me, ‘in our country it is as if babies come out of their mother’s womb with a football’,” Mukherjee laughs. 

He is an avid fan of Brazil like most Bengalis, but Mukherjee wants to see “good football”. 

On the ongoing high-profile verbal duel between the two greatest footballers – Pele and Maradona – a philosophical Mukherjee said, “One belongs to Brazil, the other is an Argentine. Quarrels between them are quite natural.” 

His enthusiasm for the sports had taken him to watch an international youth football match at north Delhi’s Ambedkar Stadium but he regrets because he had to leave the venue at half-time. He has done his best to help colleagues with the logistics to watch the World Cup: Congress MP from Mukherjee’s district, Adhir Chowdhury is going to South Africa to watch the final. 

Pranab Mukherjee, who loves to work late nights – usually till 1.00 am – on a normal day is not going to miss out the remaining games, provided Sonia Gandhi’s political secretary Ahmed Patel doesn’t spoil the party by turning up in the middle of the night to engage the minister in his usual hour-long meetings.