And there is another thing we learnt while researching for the film. As we spent more and more time with the sportspeople — players and coaches — we began realising that sport may probably be the most powerful way to build character in the young and teach new generations about honest ways to achieve recognition. It kept coming to us while writing and making the film but we were worried that it may sound like a lecture. So we didn’t talk about it directly, but we hoped that it would kind of lurk somewhere in the sub-text and touch viewers subconsciously — even magically.

I was trained to be a computer engineer and am a great believer in the power of information techno-logy to bring in positive change in developing societies. But in the course of researching for this film it dawned upon me that in the race to produce the engineers, doctors and managers so necessary for a developing nation, we have ended up completely ignoring sports and arts in our resource allocation — and we may end up a nation of selfish techno-yuppies with very little character development, a distaste for teamwork and a weird understanding of what this nation is, what its needs are, and where we and our personal quest for success, recognition and achievement can fit into all this. Maybe this is too simplistic an assumption. But then again, it may not be. And in that case, the cost of not addressing it right now may be somewhat more than what it takes to make a film.

... contd.