They must pay!

For some people, it is akin to a pilgrimage, an annual-or-so journey undertaken with near-reverence to just imbibe their share of the action. For others, it is the greatest second-hand thrill they can experience, an escapist hiatus from day-to-day drudgery. For yet some others, it is a chance to breathe the same air as the heroes they worship.

Sadly these days, it also appears that for some more, a cricket match is the window into 15 minutes of fame as the sweep of the television camera catches them hooting, waving, sporting hideously ungrammatical banners, and generally making fools of themselves.

Three consecutive one-day internationals between India and the West Indies have been marred by crowd trouble, the last of which had to be abandoned with more than 20 overs to play. Puzzlingly enough, when the crowd stepped into the fray - with a well-aimed bottle that struck Vasbert Drakes - India were 200 for one from 27.1 overs, nicely on their way to chasing down the target of 301. Latest action hero Virender Sehwag, moreover, was winding up to set pulses racing faster than they already were, unbeaten on an 82-ball 114. Why on earth, then, would an Indian supporter want to wreck a game poised at this delightful stage?

Admittedly, to stretch the point a little, there are few things people will eschew in an effort to hog the limelight. And so cricket coverage has seen its share of freaks in the crowds; from wearing women's dresses (by men, obviously!) to dressing up as Santa Claus to shaving the names of television channels into designer hairdos, nothing seems too absurd. Perhaps, then, the simple act of hurling a half-filled water bottle onto the field is only another manifestation of this publicity-seeking phenomenon.

Sociologist, writer and long-standing cricket aficionado Mukul Kesavan agrees that this might just be the case. "I think the difference between crowds now and crowds earlier (circa 1970, say) is that then you were watching a game for which you had bought a ticket and for which you had risen at five in the morning to get a decent place in the cheap seats. Watching a game was a rare and precious experience, and if you did riot, it was because your cricketing passions got the better of you," he says.

Going one step further, Kesavan adds, "Now the rowdiness seems to be more pastime than passion. My guess is that this is an extreme manifestation off the TV disease. People who come to watch cricket matches today come to watch an entertainment that they have previously seen on TV. Watching cricket on television is on par with watching other kinds of popular entertainment, such as game-shows, where the programme is as much about the studio audience as it is about the stars."

That crowds have always been on air for surprisingly long is indisputable, right from the days when Henry Blofeld discoursed at embarrassing length on the sizes, shapes and colours of jewelry sported by women in the stands, down to the modern phenomenon of cricketers-turned-commentators vainly reading out banners that fans scrawl about them. One-day cricket, thus, has not only changed the way fans view the game, but the manner in which they watch it as well.

While Indian grounds certainly have no monopoly over crowd trouble, there are several facets that are unique to them. The most relevant, probably, is the fact that the percentage of people who actually pay for their tickets at venues is an absurdly low figure.

Take the case of the recent India-West Indies Test match at Chennai. The Tamil Nadu Cricket Association (TNCA) gives out complimentary tickets under various heads. Every player who has ever represented Tamil Nadu in the Ranji Trophy, for example, gets two tickets. If the cricketer has played for India, the count usually rises. Every umpire - and there are an estimated 200-plus such registered umpires under the auspices of the TNCA - also receive their freebies. Every member of the Madras Cricket Club (MCC) gets a ticket, as do members of the Madras Race Club, which is affiliated to the MCC. In all, just these minor categories would account for several thousand tickets.

Secondly, every district association - and there are 28 such - gets a minimum of 25 and a maximum of 75 tickets, based on their relative importance. In addition to this, tickets from specified stands, sold commercially at Rs 300 are made available to them for Rs 75. Add to this the fact that every registered club - over 100 such in the five divisions that constitute the TNCA league - and you've accounted for a little more than 10,000 complimentary tickets.

Only then do the heavyweights enter the picture. Every government agency ­ the police, the municipal corporation, the water-works, you name it - gets a slab of tickets. By and large, there are no stipulated quotas, but the tickets awarded are in proportion to the clout that each of these institutions wields with the TNCA. Of course, staff from all these departments "on duty" at the venue may number another several thousand. (The Kolkata Test against Australia, to cite an example, had as many as 22,000 policemen on duty at the Eden Gardens.) Throw in the comparatively trivial numbers that make up pressmen, vendors, ball-boys, hospitality staff, and one would then hardly be surprised to find that a huge proportion of the 50,000 seats at the TNCA are just given away.

Where, then, do the paying public figure? In just a small minority in the stands. It goes without saying that people in general are infinitely more careful with their money than other peoples'. When the power blinks out in a cinema theatre, impatient audiences holler out only the choicest invective at the management until the show resumes. When someone orders a tomato-less burger at a restaurant, only to find it teeming with tomatoes, it is immediately returned with a demand for a replacement.

Would it not be logical, then, to extend these analogies to cricket? Would someone who paid of their hard-earned for a ticket be likely to throw a bottle and bring a screeching halt to the entertainment? "No spectator has any financial stake in watching the match," observes Kesavan. "The solution is selling tickets to individuals, not giving them away as freebies. Once people who want to watch cricket badly enough to pay for their tickets fill stadiums (or even half-fill them) you won't have a tenth as much trouble," summarises Kesavan.

One cannot help but think that this might be the one of the few genuine solutions to the problem. More policing, closed-circuit cameras, heavy frisking and other ad-hoc strategies to tackle the problem would be like taking an aspirin to fight the flu. The pain may ebb, but the root cause has hardly been tackled. If the authorities are serious about resolving this issue, the only way to do so is to bring the genuine cricket fans streaming back into the cricket grounds.