Harsha, unplugged

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‘Interviewing’ Harsha Bhogle is a bit of a problem for me personally.

We’ve worked out of the same office, in the Mumbai tabloid Mid-Day back way back in 1990 and off and on in the Rediff office during the early days of the site; over the years we’ve slipped into the habit of calling or texting each other when something cricket excites the imagination.

The formal ‘interview’ mode hence is damnably difficult to slip into with someone who has over nearly two decades been both respected professional, and good friend.

Still, here it is, complete and unexpurgated.

Addendum: Some folks in email asking why the video has only select clips. Short answer: the video is an hour and ten minutes long in its entirety. If we had uploaded the whole thing, all you’d get is endless “buffering”. So we published the whole transcript, with select clips for the flavor of hearing the man speak.

17 thoughts on “Harsha, unplugged”

  2. where was this interview taken?
    Anyways,superb interview!
    Sir,r u there on twitter?Would love to be in touch with you.

  4. Nice interview. The content reminded me why I used to go to rediff.com everyday, five years or so ago. The formatting reminded me why I never do anymore 🙂

  5. I thought the interview was long winded and Harsha was being politically correct (knows which side of his bread is buttered I guess)

  6. Prem-This subject could be touchy for you, but rediff is hardly the place/audience this interview belongs to, would have never known about this interview but for your blog, also I do not expect Rediff to have such classy content-lately their journalism/reporting/content has been on the brink of mediocre. There are other platforms that are able to showcase such work and do justice.

  7. Prem – It has been a long time since i read a cricket interview that was so full of insight & analysis. If i can make a reader’s request, Aakash Chopra should be high on your list for the next interview.

      • Thanks. Will look forward to that interview.

        Another suggestion – i want you/Rediff to analyse the state of cricket today – infrastructure, selection process, talent, talent identification & development. The reason is that i don’t think our BCCI is interested in developing a white paper with a vision for the next 10 years. I remember Rediff did that a few years back.

        A second series that i would love to see – how can we improve the state of the games in other indian sports – hockey etc. The key is the content that goes in these articles because these aren’t new topics but i haven’t seen good in-depth analysis in these areas for quite some time now.

    • I’d love to do more such interviews, but who? People generally give you canned responses, not thoughtful ones, which is one of the main reasons I gave up on cricket journalism in the first place. Too bloody boring. 😦

  9. The video could have included your questions too. I had to read the text to understand what Harsha was talking about.

    • The video is an hour and 10 minutes long — with Indian bandwidths, no one would have been able to follow it properly. So the guys at the sports desk clipped selected bits, just to provide a flavor of Harsha talking.

      • Yeah agree. But is there a full version uploaded anywhere? at least for folks like us with the benefit of a better connection?

        • Great interview. But can you please upload the full video so we can see your questions. Removing the questions didn’t help. In some places it felt like Harsha wan’t giving you a chance to finish your lines 🙂

          • Kalki, Santhip: Will try and upload the video onto my site, in full. Will have to be next week — leaving for the weekend in a bit.

            Santhip, I don’t think it was about letting me finish, or whatever. He is intelligent enough to know where I am going, so when his answer is framed in his mind he just takes off. Half the time, when we talk on the phone I’m the one talking his ears off. 🙂

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