How hockey legend Mohammed Shahid came to define India

What lamps ceased to burn, what hearts ceased to beat..

If art is all about a painter's expression on the canvas, where he uses strokes with the brush and colours to infuse life in the images, Mohammed Shahid did exactly that on the hockey field.

As the genius from Varanasi breathed his last in Gurgaon on Wednesday, July 21, after end-stage renal failure, he left millions of hockey lovers in tears.

Today's generation of sporting fans watches cricket, football, Formula One, NBA and other highly televised sport at home and pubs and cheers the magic moments. Sadly, if you ask them about Shahid, the hockey hero who was part of India's golden campaign in the Moscow Olympics, they may draw a blank.

Hockey is a sport for the romanticists. If you do not like today's fast and furious hockey, chances are you may have loved hockey in yesteryears where there was room for creativity, magic and individual skills to flourish.

Shahid defined beauty in hockey.

And Shahid also defined brilliance in hockey. Shahid had the gift of body feint and dodge, stick work and speed, which more often than not reduced the other 21 players on the field to mere onlookers, if not bystanders.

I was lucky enough to watch this “God of hockey” live a few times in the field where the rival opposition would be numbed by his magical presence.

He would create chances with utter ease. He did not rely on being a bully to get past the defenders. When he moved on the turf, the body motion was fluid and the hockey stick appeared as if there was glue on it and the ball stuck to it.

I still remember some time in 1988-89, when Dutch clubs would come and play hockey in the capital, there was a team called de Boekanier. I interacted with Tom van't Hek, a former Dutch star at the National Stadium.

I asked him about hockey and magic, he immediately mentioned Shahid's name. But he was quick to add. "The problem is when Shahid plays on the field, you need to two balls as he keeps one ball with himself!"

Those words have stuck in my memory forever and like van't Hek, almost any player who had played in a match featuring Shahid will vouch for sheer genius being “selfish” with the ball.

In India, whenever we talk about the rich history of hockey and Olympics, we almost immediately invoke Dhyan Chand, a man who even Adolf Hitler went to watch. After that, we will count the legends like Balbir Singh Sr and Jr.

Shahid belonged to a different era. An era where he learnt the nuances of the sport on grass, played in Sports Hostel, Lucknow and then went on to become a master on astro turf.

Mind you, Shahid did not have bulging muscles or looked strong. He was robust and compact, with the footwork electrifying. He could make the straight dash and weave his way past defenders, one, two, three and at times even four with the ball in his possession.

For the sheer thrill of this alone, it was not hockey which attracted fans but Shahid.

The kind of understanding Shahid displayed with Zafar Iqbal as the winger and the Varanasi magician as the inside forward on the left flank was a treat to watch.

Sadly, he was not able to produce this kind of wizardry in the 1982 Asian Games final in the capital. Pakistan crushed India and Hassan Sardar was the hero of that victory.

Shahid's fame was spread far and wide. If he was immensely popular in India, people flocked to see him in Malaysia, Los Angeles, and even Pakistan.

The rivalry between India and Pakistan in the sporting arena is as old as the rivalry between the two nations. Yet if one man commanded respect and was spoken of in awe, it was Mohammed Shahid, even across the border.

A player like Shahid comes once in a lifetime. He has passed away but memories will remain etched forever, exactly the way an artist leaves behind the masterpiece he created with the brush and paint.

RIP, Mohammed Shahid.