India, Pakistan clash sparks surge in airline and hotel prices

AS the bus crossed Usmanpura, a popular soft-drink brand’s electronic glow-sign board announced the temperature in an innovative manner — Ahmedabad city: 35 degrees. Motera: 37 degrees.

By 11 am on Saturday (14), all roads led to the Narendra Modi Stadium for the World Cup’s most-awaited clash — India versus Pakistan.

The entire city seemed to be covered in blue as traffic slowed down considerably even if it didn’t come to a standstill.

One has spoken about the dichotomy of Ahmedabad, where there was hardly any pre-match buzz but all tickets were reportedly sold months in advance.

On Saturday, the reason was clear – more than the locals, the bulk of the people (over 100,000) present at the stadium were from outside the city, many of whom are NRIs.

From Bangkok to Bengaluru, Singapore to Surat and Detroit to Delhi, fans started descending on the city from Friday (13) night.

Ahmedabad is already in celebratory mode with Navratri starting on Sunday (15) and an India match filled with heavy-duty emotional quotient and patriotic punch added to the festive fervour.

Shankar Mahadevan, Sunidhi Chauhan, Arijit Singh singing ‘Vande Mataram’ just as Shaheen Shah Afridi and Babar Azam were going through the paces during their pre-match routine added to the atmosphere.

Mahadevan performed ‘Suno Ghaur se Duniyawaalon’ at the imposing Motera as the more than half-filled stadium at that time joined the chorus.

It reached a crescendo when Sachin Tendulkar walked out with the World Cup.

Dipak Shivratri, a surgeon from Bengaluru with his two friends from the IT industry, landed in the city on Friday night, having booked hotels at a premium price.

“There was absolutely no chance of getting tickets online. Someone DMed me on social media and we bought three tickets for Rs 25,000 each (£247), whose marked price was Rs 2000 (£19.8). We wanted to watch the match and bought it, but not everyone can afford the price,” he said.

Three youngsters from Surat said that they got their tickets for free as they knew someone who is politically well-connected.

“We got it for free due to our connections but during last two days, the prices did come down a lot. Not everyone can afford to pay around £247-£297 per ticket. And no one will buy just one ticket. Now a lot of people bargained and didn’t buy.

“Hence, if you were lucky, the tickets worth £19.8 was available for £49, but you need to know the right people,” he added.

The India-Pakistan match created a mini ancillary industry as everyone went laughing their way to the bank.

Whether it was the hotels that charged more than the usual rates or the restaurants that remained crowded on Friday evening. The airline industry wouldn’t be unhappy either.

There were also two cottage industries that saw a boom in the build-up to the Pakistan game.

One was the black marketing of tickets which doesn’t happen like the old times, where you are trying to find a possible buyer outside the stadium gate. Here, it is high-tech and people who were in possession of tickets made humongous profits.

The other cottage industry was the one about counterfeit India jerseys.

In the past 10-12 years, across all ICC tournament never did an entire stadium feel like an ocean of blue supporting their loved XI.

The Indian team’s sponsors original jersey costs a bomb and not every middle-class person can afford that.

So the ‘Jigisha bens’ and ‘Rasik bhais’, on the pavements across the roads leading up to the stadium, made a killing selling the counterfeit India jerseys ranging from anything between £2 to £10, depending on the quality and one’s bargaining powers.

The roadside jersey seller, each and everyone of them made profit and contributed their bit to the counterfeit industry.

Amid the hullabaloo, five Pakistani journalists were able to make it on time for the match.

“We travelled through Wagah-Attari border and took a flight from Amritsar to Ahmedabad. We have been given city wise visa wherever Pakistan is playing,” one of the senior journalists said.

So was procurement of visa an issue? “Well, we got in one day after we were asked to submit our passports.” With 22 players on the field and more than 100,000 Indians and five Pakistani scribes inside the stadium, the match that would remain ODI cricket’s lifeline going forward, started.

(PTI)