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 Charu
Sharma is a familiar face with the Indian TV Viewers. This man
has been on the Television for about 23 years now. B.V.Swagath
had an interview with this well known Sports Presenter on the
30th of March, 2005 during the India A Vs Pakistan warm up game.
In this freewheeling chat, Charu talks about Diving, Doordarshan,
fellow Commentators and just about everything else. As it turned
out , Charu opened up and unleashed a dazzling array of shots of
his own. The end result was of course a very interesting
conversation.
Whenever we think about sports presenters
from India, two people come to our mind immediately one is
Harsha Bhogle and two is of course the man sitting in front of
me, Charu Sharma. So talk us through your success story.
Well I am not happy with the concept of success story, we all
are just doing our jobs and you know it’s for other people to
really think whether we are successful or not. For me success
means just working hard, making sure that you do the best
possible job every time you can, that is very important;
constant learning, constant improvement and constant acceptance
of criticism and so on. But yeah on the other hand I have to say
that I have been very fortunate to make a living in an area of
deep interest and passion. And where I come from is not the
media or the broadcasting media, I come from a background of
being a sportsman myself and that’s what I always was, that’s
what I am, that’s what I will and that’s what I will die as a
sportsman. And the fact that I can talk about it and earn a
living how can I be happier more than this.
Language doesn’t seem
to be a problem for you I mean you easily shift from English to
Hindi and vice versa, how about that?
I think for all of us language is always a constant problem.
That’s what I meant by constant learning and improvement.
Language is something that you have to learn more and more every
time, get a bigger, better and wider vocabulary, get all your
pronunciations right, get your fluency right. I wouldn’t say it
has never been a problem, I think I have consciously worked on
it to make sure it becomes less of a problem as we go along.
So what’s your cricketing background?
Well when I say I have a sporting background, I really mean that
I was a Junior National champion in Diving for many years, 6 to
be exact. I played just about every sport at a fairly and
serious competitive level. Cricket is something I couldn’t play
much at the school level or the college level because of my deep
involvement in my own sport – Spring Board Diving. But when I
moved from water to land, I played lot of first division club
cricket for the Calcutta Cricket and Football Club and when I
was in Hyderabad, I played for VST that is Vazir Sultan Tobacco
and you know very well it’s in the A-division of Hyderabad
Cricket Leagues. So there was all that serious stuff like you
know every sportsman, when you are on the field you play
seriously.
I
got a phone call a little while ago informing me that Charu
Sharma was a Bronze Medalist in one of the National Games in
Spring Board Diving, could you talk about it?
Like I said I was a Junior Champion at the National level for 6
years in a row from the age of 11. The only time I got entry
into the National Games was when I was old enough to participate
and I got bronze. Both the Gold medallist and the Silver
medallist were from the army and could practice the whole day
whereas I was still at college and had extremely limited
practice facilities. But yeah very safely I can say that I was
among the top 3 divers in the country for a while until I
retired at the ripe old age of 19 because where else could one
go with diving. It took me to where it could, the sport had
little scope and I had to give it up. I also qualified for the
Commonwealth Games in 1978 but had to give up as I had to go on
my own expenses.
Okay…which was your first cricket match
as a commentator?
Oh boy! I can’t remember. My career as a presenter/commentator
took off during the 1982 Commonwealth Games and that’s almost 23
years ago. Its very hard for me to remember everything, I did a
few odd cricket matches along the way but there wasn’t much
coverage anyway during those days. And with the entry of
Satellite channels, my first contract was with Star Sports in
1995-96. It was the Singer Cup in Singapore, where Sanath
Jayasuriya got his world record for the fastest 100 and I had
done lot of in-studio work and commentary began there after.
What is the difference between Charu
Sharma of those days and Charu Sharma these days?
Fatter, balder, older hahaha. But obviously if you work
regularly at anything, that’s the meaning of experience you
know. You gain a lot by working with different kind of people
all the time, different gangs, different channels for many years
and all of that adds to the word called maturity. So I think one
becomes matured, more experienced and more aware of the fact
that you need to constantly learn and get better all the time.
Doordarshan seems to have been very
instrumental in shaping your career as a presenter, what do you
think?
A very true statement because I started with Doordarshan in 1982
during the 9th Asian Games, that’s when my career began. It
wasn’t really as a profession then. But I have worked with DD
from 1982 to 1992 for most of the major International and
National Events sporadically. Only after the advent of the
Satellite channels, sports broadcasting became a profession in
India and therefore had to leave DD in order to pursuit this as
a career; Had to leave DD because of the exclusive contracts.
Now of course I am back on DD because of the circumstances that
made it happen. And for me it makes sense because they are the
only channel with the rights for covering Cricket in India for
the last 5 years. DD as you know has its own constraints,
limitations, of course they can be better in quality but I got a
job to do, try to bring out the best out of me everyday.
What's the challenge that a sports
presenter has to face and how do you cope up with it?
Everyday is a new challenge, there’s no doubt about it. When you
are working on Television, even 2 or 3 seconds of silence or 1
or 2 errors here and they are prone to intensify scrutiny, it’s
like dying a silent death when you don’t know what to say.
Challenge is to make sure that you have enough to talk about
every time, you have enough knowledge, do your homework so that
you are not caught short, you are always alert, you are always
thinking on your feet and never give a slip out. You got to
depend on your instinct all the time and Television is so
demanding that you can never give less than 100% every time.
Who has been your favourite commentator
who might have inspired you to come to this level?
Remember I had come to this scene in 1982 and Television was
almost non existent in India then. So they were absolutely no
idols, no favourites. I was just a sportsman who drifted into
this field because there was an opportunity to work in 1982. But
thereafter one got to listen to many good commentators in
different sports and learn a lot from each one of them.
Subconsciously I might have picked up what other commentators do
or try to understand what they were trying to do and put it in
my own style. If you are talking only about cricket since you
are on Cricketfundas.com, then I got to name a few. Ian Chappel
is a very good Television man, he understands the demands of TV,
the amount of time and response and there is no shortage of
knowledge from him of course. Apart from him we have Arun Lal
who is so keen on the game, we have L.S. Sivaramakrishnan who is
very sharp and picks up a lot of things which others don’t
notice. These guys are good, remember they have been given an
opportunity only a few years back and they have utilized it
tremendously. They have worked hard at their language and
interpretation of the game. Sanjay Manjrekar is another one who
works very hard, I know as I have worked with him quite a lot
and he always is looking for something new, something better and
improvement whether it is a word or a sentence, way of
describing things. There is lot of efforts put in by these guys
and that to me is well worthy of appreciation.
Which has been your most enjoyable
commentary stint?
That’s country dependent, production dependent, so I hugely
enjoyed South Africa in 1997-98 and of course the World Cup on
Sony. I see the smile for the World Cup on your face haha (as
the interviewer recollects about the
Yextra
Yinnings Script on Cricketfundas.com). I also enjoyed
Champions Trophy, few tournaments in Sri Lanka with the bands
playing in the background, West Indies is always inspiring
happiness and I also enjoyed the U19 World Cup last year with
Sony in Bangladesh. There weren’t any stars but everyone was
working hard, there were all these Shikhar Dhawan, Robin Uthappa,
Suresh Raina and it’s nice to see them today playing for India
A.
And most embarrassing moments…
I don’t know there must have been many and there are few who are
always constantly looking out for your mistakes and make a laugh
out of it, fair enough. It’s very difficult to be 100% error
free, everyone makes mistakes and it’s all about forgetting
about them and recover quickly and carry on with your job. I had
a couple of tough moments though in South Africa. With beers
allowed on the field, the spectators do become very happy and
out of their conscience after the game. And Sunny and I had to
do lot of shows on the boundary line. Sometimes you had things
thrown at us, ice thrown at us, sometimes people use to come and
dance behind us to distract us from doing our work. Sunny got
really annoyed, although I took it in the right spirit, for
someone of Sunny’s stature it was too much and eventually had to
ask for security ring. These were some of the real good nice
moments where one had to have a good presence of mind and
shouldn't get distracted and just carry on with your work.
Roshini or Mandira, whom do you prefer
to be your co-presenter?
Both and none. You know what I mean hahaha. They do bring their
own personalities to the table and both are really cheerful and
both are happy to learn about the game. They take their role
very seriously in the production; they just don’t take
everything in a light fashion at all. Mandira of course had the
benefit of a fabulous production in Sony and of course a
fabulous platform in World Cup and also the Champions Trophy.
Unfortunately Roshini only had to bear with Doordarshan and
their inadequate style. But in substance, the programs we do now
in India are no less because you talk the same cricket, you talk
the same language. It’s just that people also tend to judge you
on the glitz, glamour, style and hype which is obviously missing
in DD. So I feel sorry for Roshini because every girl needs
that, I don’t and so do the other cricketers who sit along with
us. We just have to sit there and talk, it doesn’t matter what
we wear, how we look or how the background is but she could use
more support in terms of style and sorry for her. Both Mandira
and Roshini have done their job, I don’t know what their job is
and let’s not go there. But obviously their presence in such
programs I am not saying success has been noticed hugely, widely
and has been copied by just about everybody else. May be there’s
some merit in having them; I had like the other people to sneak
in and run a poll on their presence. But obviously they are nice
people to be with and enjoyable.
This is the 1st time that you are
coming to the Visaka International Stadium, Hyderabad, what’s
your feedback on it?
For starters, I am very happy that the grass on the outfield has
been left unshaved; it’s good to see that the batsmen are made
to earn their runs. Normally it’s shaved so closely that if you
just find the gap the ball races away to the boundary without
giving a chance to the fielders, what’s the point and the
bowlers get frustrated. And I am also happy that some grass has
been left on the pitch and run making is difficult, batsmen
might be unhappy, but it gives the bowlers opportunities. As you
see India A could post just 189 may be the openers need to be
cautious early on and not start banging from ball no.1. But the
stadium is incomplete and I know there’s plenty of work to be
done and the crowd turn out which is just 1500 is disappointing.
So that really doesn’t give a good impression about the ground.
But we had 30,000 capacity crowds for
all the 3 days during the Duleep Trophy game between South Zone
and West Zone, a month ago…
So what’s the problem now?
I am shocked to see such a sparse crowd
to begin with! I think we got that much crowd during Duleep
Trophy because no.1 the entry was free during that game, no.2
there was no live telecast and no.3 the presence of Sachin,
Dravid and other stars.
May be exams, the heat and I want to add a comment here,
unfortunately in India, people are flocking to see their
favourite stars and not the cricket and that’s a pity. Even
today some of the stars are missing on the field for Pakistan
like Inzamam, Youhana and others. So that’s not a happy trend
because people just come here for taking the pleasure of having
a look at the players and chant their names and go back home
without really bothering about the game. May be it’s because of
the media hype on the players.
What has been the most annoying
question on the Fourth Umpire show?
Hahaha I don’t think there have been annoying questions.
Basically if one considers the amount of difficulty in getting
through the line and somehow ask a question or so, only thing I
have noticed is most of them have only one thing in their mind;
“we didn’t get through…we didn’t get through” and then ask a
question without realizing that the answer for that was being
discussed for the last 15 minutes! It’s like we are talking that
the team is now depending on Virender Sehwag, Virender Sehwag
for 15 mins and you get a question “excuse me don’t you think
the Indian team depends on Virender Sehwag only”. “Listen yaar
didn’t you follow the program for the last 15 mins? What were
you doing?” So the questions that come in normally have been
answered already and you don’t want to be rude and say this
question has been answered and say next. So you just give a
short answer to each question and carry on.
Okay…my personal view is that you have
been naughty in your comments whenever there is a talk about
Sachin Tendulkar. Do you agree or not? Roshini seems to be a big
devotee of Sachin Tendulkar…and your mischievous smiles do not
hide the facts…
Yeah… I would object to the word naughty. I try and incite some
excitement on the sets. Some person is not doing well and he is
somebody else’s favourite, so I just ask excuse me what has
happened. This is something inborn and something which I have
inculcated over time. The point is neutrality, however big the
star might be, regardless of his powers and I just don’t gush
that so and so is my favourite and so on. I just have to go out
on the basis of what has happened that day. My role is
neutrality and I live up to it but sometimes just in lighter
vein of course I don’t mean any harm and I have never made
damning statements, just one or two lighter comments here and
there. But naughty is exaggerating hahaha but mischief yes after
all who wants a boring program yaar. Why not…Why not….
Now
a question we really love to see on the Fourth Umpire Show,
Doordarshan never shows the final ball of an over completely!
Now what are your comments?
I would answer this under protest! DD never show the final ball
of an over…wrong. They always show and it’s just that compared
to other channels they may just go off air 1-2 seconds earlier.
A second or two might be critical, the score needs to be read
out, but you have seen the ball, the ball was just dropped near
the batsman and no run taken and DD goes off for a commercial
that’s fair enough. But because they go off air so soon and
something does happen, then of course the action has been missed
and that’s where they have been caught napping at times. And
they come back a bit late with the bowler in middle of his run
up and not the start of it. But I don’t agree that DD never
shows the final ball or the first ball of an over. If you look
at the cold statistics, they might just miss out 7 balls in the
entire match, but why even miss a single ball? Even that’s
irritating; it’s so easy to criticize a company that never
fights back, DD never have the press conferences, never need any
hype, promotions or hoopla, they are never into all these PR
things you know. So when somebody doesn’t respond everybody
attacks.
But there are lots of scorers who have
to follow the TV Coverage and many cases they just don’t know if
runs are off the pads or the bat because DD doesn’t give the
opportunity for the viewers to see what the umpire’s signal is…
Aaah I see ok…fair enough fair enough. Very clearly commas run
the game right? What they have to do is fine tune the
advertisements timing I mean I can’t speak for them because I am
not employed by them; I just work because there’s a working
opportunity. But I do know as we speak now, they are fine tuning
in selling their advertisements time a little expensively and
cut short some time. At the same time make the same amount of
money even by cutting the advertisements marginally. Increase
the cost by 10% and still make the same revenue, it’s an easy
formula and I am sure they would do it now. But anyone who has
bought the rights for showing cricket had to do it by spending
so much and they just do not have any choice but to recover the
expenditure by advertisements.
Charu Sir, you have covered lot of
cricket over the years, what’s your take on Shahid Afridi’s
faster delivery? Now I mean about the legalities of that
delivery.
Once in a while, he comes in with a leg spin grip and changes
his action to fast bowling or off spin and that looks very funny
and dodgy. Bowling a quicker one by changing from leg spin
action to fast bowling is difficult and can be done only by some
special abilities or if I can use the word “crossing the borders
of legalities”. Obviously some authority has to come in and
check the thing. But you will have to take all the photo
analysis and the scientific analysis.
We don’t expect Chris Broad or the
umpires to report Afridi for chucking his faster ones, but what
about you and the commentators and the media? All the time it’s
just “terrific bowling, “tremendous bowling”…
Well yeah it is fair enough if he has bowled a good leg break
and has taken a wicket. But when he bowls his faster one yes the
visual impression is that he chucks. But the media doesn’t mean
just the Television commentators alone, it includes all the
newspapers and even websites like yours!
We already have an article published on
this topic titled
ICC
– International Chucking Controversies?
Ok, but we just got to study that more factually and if someone
comes in and calls him for a test will he chuck? No he wouldn’t
bowl that delivery at all and easily get away with it, it’s just
the pressure of the game, need of the hour, the demand of the
situation, when such bowlers just cross the borders of
legalities and bend their elbow. Any one having suspect action
has to be checked scientifically under proper conditions.
One final question, what's the process
you have to go through to become a Harsha Bhogle or a Charu
Sharma?
Don’t! Just be yourself. But I know what you mean. There are
very few opportunities actually in the world of sports. Today we
have 80 channels and out of which only 2-3 sports channels and
the sport shown in these channels is at the highest level. For
me it was just luck being at the right place at the right time
and other factors. I am sure Harsha will have his own story to
tell about this. But I wouldn’t encourage any youngster to try
and make it to this field and eventually get frustrated with the
lack of opportunities.
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