DIWAN-E-AAM

What do IPL and the mango have in common? Indians love both, both are the centre of stormy arguments and both can end up creating the most unholy mess. Indians are gage over IPL and they're orgiastic about mangoes. IPL is divided into teams, each of which has its assertive fans. There are the Mumbai Indians and the Chennai super Kings to name only two (who are known, respectively, as the Mumbai Idiots and the Chennai Supporters of the other teams). Mangoes have their own competing teams so to speak.

First is the Alphonso (which is also known to its intimates by its nickname, Haphoos). The Alphonso (or Haphoos) is claimed by its adherents to be the king of mangoes. The Alphonsoese - as Alphonso lovers sometimes call themselves - claim that the Alphonso should be declared India's National Fruit, in support of which contention they quote the song composed by a famous poet which almost became the country's national anthem: Sare Jahan se achchha, Alphonso hamara.

Codswallop, retort those who favor the Alphonso's closest rival, the Sinduri, which in some parts of the country is called Gulabkhas. (Mangoes, like cricketers, tend to go in a lot for aliases, like sachin also being known as Master Blaster and Harbhajan as Bhajji.) The Sinduri - or Gulab khas - is so called because of its patches of red which contrast prettily with the rest of its green skin.

Third - some would say not third at all, but leading the pack - is the curiously named Langra, which comes - or rather limps - all the way from Benaras. No one knows why the Langra is called the Langra. However, an NGO advocacy group which champions the cause of politically correct terminology is believed to have launched a movement to have the Langra's name, with its derogatory connotations, changed by deed poll to PI, which is not a mathematical quantity but the abbreviated version of physically impaired. But whatever the type of mango eating it is a messy business. IPL created a mess thanks to sweat equity. Mangoes create a mess thanks to squirt equality. Looks at a man about to eat a mango, the mango is on a plate, beside which is a knife. The mango is the patient the plate is the operating table and the knife is the scalpel with which the man is about to perform one of the trickiest operations known to humankind; how to cut open and eat a mango without making a total muck-up of it. The man balances the mango on its broader end, tongue sticking out of the side of his mouth to maintain balance, and with the knife tries to cut off one cheek - let's say the right cheek - of the mango. The mango stone gets in the way. The man turns the mango around to make a second incision from the other side, so that two cuts can meet, thus enabling one hemisphere of the mango to come away free from the stone and the rest of the fruit. Frowning with concentration, the man completes the second cut. The two cuts don't meet. The cut mango is dripping juice, but its flesh is still inaccessible. The man decides to try cut off the other the left, cheek of the fruit. Makes the two cuts, same result. By now the mangled fruit is oozing juice and the squirt equity is coming into play. Plate and hands full of sticky mango squirt, the man desperate by now, looks around to see no one of tender age or finer sensibilities is watching, says the hell with it, and tries to rip the goddam thing apart with sheer muscle power. There is s sound like an elephant pulling its foot out of quicksand and the mango explodes in a spray of yellowish orange guck that covers the table, the man's clothes and a part of the ceiling. The mango stone lands on the man's lap, as the holds the dismembered, dripping halves of the butchered fruit in each hand. End of civilization as we know it. The man looks heavenwards and utters one short, sharp word. Mothers cover up the ears of their children. Susceptible auntiejis swoon in shock. Bouncers come and take the man away.

Mango's Not for this man, no when it comes to the king of fruits I am a strictly no-aam aadmi.