Cricket in full bloom

by Amit Roy

INDIA AND UK FANS’ LOVE OF GAME MARKED AT CHELSEA FLOWER SHOW

TO BE sure, there are many keen gardeners in the British Asian community, but the propor­tion is not as high as might have been expect­ed, considering so many have come from rural backgrounds, especially in the Punjab.

In Kenya and Uganda, too, I have seen bou­gainvillea spilling over garden walls and in spec­tacular bloom on the road between Mombasa and Malindi. In this country, I know Lord Navnit Dholakia loves gardening as does Lakshmi Mit­tal’s wife, Usha.

But in a conversation once with Virendra Sharma, the Labour MP for Ealing Southall ad­mitted that there were many Asian homes in his constituency where the front garden had been covered in concrete so as to accommodate two Mercedes for off-street parking.

Fresh from attending the royal wedding, the Queen was quick to visit the Chelsea Flower Show as she does most years.

This year, the Royal Horticultural Society has joined forces with the NHS “to promote the positive impact that gardening has on mental health in the NHS’s 70th year”.

For Asians, who are vulnerable to diabetes and heart disease, the benefits of gardening are obvious. For those of us who spend too many hours hunched over a computer, it is also prob­ably a soothing experience.

This year there is a special reason for visiting what is probably the most prestigious flower show in the world. To mark its 70th year in India, the British Council has commissioned eminent landscape artist Sarah Eberle to create a garden inspired by “the UK and India’s shared love of cricket”. And the garden has the blessings of Sachin Tendulkar.

Back in February, Eastern Eye trailed the con­cept of the garden and now we can see it in its full glory.

Early one morning I caught Eberle – who has won a record 15 gold medals for gardening, nine of them at Chelsea – along with Alan Gemmell, who had flown over from India where he is di­rector of the British Council (“the best job in the British Council”) to talk about the project.

The most striking feature of this imaginative garden are the outsize wooden stumps, three metres high, with photographs at the back of young women cricketers.

“And the grass strip in between is meant to be the pitch,” Eberle pointed out.

As far as the floral display is concerned, the star of the show is undoubtedly the Himalayan blue poppy (Meconopsis) which she chose because “it reflects the blue of the Indian cricket jersey”.

There are a number of large cricket balls tossed in among the marigolds (genus Tagetes), the blue orchid (Vanda coerulea), the sacred lo­tus (Nelumbo nucifera), and roses (Rosaceae), the flower of the Mughals. “Rose motifs often feature in Mughal architecture across northern India, including at the Taj Mahal.”

To produce marble walls engraved with semi-precious stones, Eberle went to India and re­cruited craftsmen “who have worked on the res­toration of the Taj”.

According to Gemmell, the idea is to use sport and culture to inspire 100,000 boys and girls, aged 10 to 12, across India through “integrated physical education classes, using cricket and (dance) movement to challenge gender stereo­types and open up opportunities for everyone”.

The project, named Changing Moves Chang­ing Minds is backed by the Marylebone Cricket Club and the Royal Academy of Dance, as well as a number of commercial sponsors in India, in­cluding the Piramal group.