Howzzat

by Greenstone Lobo

  In 2008, I left my job at the bank to join an insurance company. This was to become the company where I would stay for over a decade—until the end of my corporate career, when I decided to focus solely on astrology.

  When I resigned from the bank, the sales director, Vikas Agnihotri, a football fan, after wishing me good luck, winked and said, ‘And, keep sending me those football predictions.’ Wow! It was heartening to know that people in high positions, too, were keen to know my views. Vikas was someone who didn’t believe in barriers. Anyone could walk up to him at any time. And that reflected the culture of the bank. But it made me happy that I was noticed—if not directly for my profession, then at least for my passion.

  That was the power of sports. I remember predicting that Spain would win the UEFA Euro in 2008. Vikas promised me a lunch treat if that indeed happened. He was busy then. Now, as the country head of one of the largest companies in the world, he is perhaps busier than ever. Vikas, you still owe me that lunch!

  Euro 2008 gave me even more confidence to proceed with my research on cricket. I decided to continue with my explorations in the field of sports predictions. Wouldn’t it be great if I could announce to the world who would win the next cricket World Cup in 2011? I thought it would just be a pipe dream, until it actually happened. But I had to thank football once again for that.

  5.

  Dhoni and the Uranus Connection

  23rd December 2004. Mumbai.

  I was thrilled to find that the Fab Four of Indian cricket, Sachin Tendulkar, Sourav Ganguly, VVS Laxman and Rahul Dravid, were born in the patch 1972–74, the same patch I was born in. It was very important, personally, to know which planets ruled this period since those planets were the key to understanding my own career. By 2005 I knew that these were Planet-X and Planet-Z.

  I discovered that one of these planets was in my ninth house. The ninth house of a horoscope indicates being a subject matter expert, a teacher, a writer or a coach. I was thrilled to find that those were precisely the areas where my interests lay. I had gradually shifted from sales to training after doing my Master’s in Human Resources. I had relocated to Mumbai from Madhya Pradesh and was now working with the largest FMCG company in the country. Keen students of astrology would know that even astrology is ruled by the ninth house. I was super happy that I was headed in the right direction. I had been able to use the vocational guidance of astrology upon myself.

  I had found out that Planet-Z and Planet-X gave you success over a period of time. Rarely did they make you a phenomenon overnight. Consequently, I asked myself if there were planets which made someone a success overnight, just like that! I got my answer soon.

  Sourav Ganguly had wondered[2] where MS Dhoni was when India was playing the 2003 World Cup final against Australia. Well, Dhoni was a ticket collector with the Indian Railways at that time. Sourav can be excused if he believes that had Dhoni played the finisher, he would have won the match against the mighty Aussies that year. But Sourav is not aware of the fact that Uranians don’t progress steadily; they arrive suddenly and like a hurricane.

  Now, let us talk about the planet which makes the man Mahendra Singh Dhoni—the planet which won him the first World Cup of the game in its newest avatar.

  Uranus rules all inventions, discoveries and groundbreaking ideas. Isn’t that cool? Yes, Uranus really is the cool dude of the zodiac. People associated with this planet are eccentric and non-conformist geniuses. Somehow I liked this strange planet with its electric-blue hues. As I have the moon in the Uranus-ruled Aquarius myself, I could understand the idiosyncrasies and eccentricities associated with them. But never did I imagine that my research would lead me to pinpoint its exact exaltation point—an original discovery.

  Uranus was discovered in 1781 by the English astronomer, Sir William Herschel. It is a humongous planet, fourteen times the size of Earth and its movement has been described as erratic[3]. Uranus rotates on a whopping 98-degree tilt! Basically, its north and south poles are where the Earth’s equator would be. However, the strangest thing about it is its erratic magnetosphere. A magnetosphere is the magnetism surrounding a planet. Unlike Earth and Jupiter’s, which are pretty much constant, the magnetic field on Uranus turns on and off as if someone is flipping a switch.

  This different orbit and magnetosphere is indicative of the rebelliously innovative views of its children. Its discovery also roughly coincided with the French and American revolutions. It is truly a planet that influences new thoughts and fosters mutinous views.

  The influence of Uranus can bring in sudden but progressive changes in society. People with a strong Uranus never bend to rules; rather, they set their own principles and pace, and believe in the disruption of the old order. They are inventive, rebellious, original and resourceful. They have a strong need to be different from the herd though sometimes it can be rebellion for rebellion’s sake, they can also be harbingers of change.

  Uranus rules Aquarius. It also rules the brain, especially the pituitary gland. The symbol for Uranus is a cross atop a circle, flanked on each side by a half circle. It signifies a spirit ruled by its mind. It also signifies a synthesis of the attributes of all the planets.

  Interestingly, Uranus is the ruling planet of our cricket superstar, Mahendra Singh Dhoni. It rules one half of him. The genius of Dhoni can be attributed to Uranus. His quicksilver brainwork that often left people dazed and was lauded as the master stroke of a genius—was simply the consequence of Uranus.

  Dhoni has all the trappings of Uranus. The first four matches he played were insignificant as he came lower down the order. He burst on the scene suddenly in Visakhapatnam on 5th April 2005 with his match-winning knock against Pakistan when Ganguly decided to promote him to number three. He had never been noticed in the Under-16 or Under-19 matches. He had never played an Under-19 World Cup like Virat Kohli or Yuvraj Singh. Nor had he made hundreds of runs like VVS Laxman in the domestic circuit before being drafted into the Indian team.

  Dhoni looked different. He had Greek-god looks with a lion-like mane. He won the inaugural T20 World Cup in South Africa in September 2007. T20 was the newest form of cricket at that time that was revolutionising the sport. When T20 was invented in 2003, Uranus was in its own house. Uranus is the planet of innovation, and Dhoni who had Uranus in the deepest exaltation in his chart, was chosen to win its first contest.

  Did someone mention Uranus is ice cool? Yes, I did. And you know now why Dhoni is too, right? With the willow in hand he turned a typical Uranian, totally destructive in a positive way.

  Kapil Dev’s World Cup win occurred due to the influence of Pluto. Pluto is a disruptive force that brings in transformation. It gives birth to something while Uranus makes an existing something even better. The Lumiere brothers Auguste and Louis had Pluto exalted in their horoscopes and gave birth to cinema. Walt Disney, who had Uranus exalted in his horoscope, made cinema better with his uniqueness. Pluto’s child, Kapil Dev, won a World Cup for India for the first time. Uranus’s child, Dhoni, won the first World Cup in its most innovative and newest form.

  Unlike other prominent cricketers, Dhoni didn’t come from a large city or have any godfathers in cricket. Before he arrived on the scene, cricket was all about elegance and style blended with concentration: slow and steady. Dhoni was all about power, energy and being ahead of the game with smart thinking. He innovated with the helicopter shot and closed games with brutal but calculated assaults. Dhoni proved that you didn’t need to stick to old customs to get results. His field placements were baffling for the purists, but most often got the results.

  His now famous, unexpected techniques flummoxed his opponents—and his spectators—most of the time. But boy, did they pay off and how! Only he could have visualised asking the unknown bowler, Joginder Sharma, to bowl the last over of the T20 World Cup (that India won) and make a hero out of him.

  You call it as a stroke of genius? I would call it a strike of Uranus.

  6.

  The Great IP
L Tamasha and the Birth of a Golden Goose

  April 2008. Mumbai.

  When MS Dhoni won the inaugural 2007 T20 Cricket World Cup and paraded with the victorious team on an open bus, I was a worried man. Uranus rules inventions. It is the planet that loves breaking down old structures and establishing new ones. Call it luck, call it being at the right place at the right time, or just call it destiny. But, to anybody who believes in astrology, it is simply the planets at work. This is what I believe.

  Hence, Dhoni becoming the captain of the T20 format was not a fluke. Uranus rules everything new. T20 too was new. Uranus breaks shackles and brings in a new invention or even a revolution. Dhoni, with the power of Uranus, became the first captain to win a world cup in this revolutionary new format in cricket.

  My worry was: was this the only major tournament MSD would win in his life? What about the most coveted trophy, the 50-over World Cup? Did he still have it in him to win another major tournament in 2011? Should this achievement be considered a major one or not? Would this victory go down as iconic or would it fizzle out and lose its relevance? Uranus had already given him a World Cup; could it give him another one?

  Another thought nagging me was about a missed sequence in the planets. If we arranged the sequence of the cricket World Cup wins on the basis of the birth year of the captains who won them, it looked like this:

  1944-1944-1959-1954-1952-1963-1965-1974-1974, the captains being Clive Lloyd-Clive Lloyd-Kapil Dev-Allan Border-Imran Khan-Steve Waugh-Ricky Ponting-Ricky Ponting.

  Now compare this with the sequence of the years of the football World Cup wins. It looked like this:

  1945-1953-1952-1960-1961-1963-1968-1970-1973; Franz Beckenbauer-Daniel Passarella-Dino Zoff-Diego Maradona-Lothar Matthaus-Dunga-Didier Deschamps-Cafu-Fabio Cannavaro.

  I saw that in the sequence connected to football, the flow was smooth from one set of planets to another. In cricket, the years were a bit jumbled, but still all the years had got their due and a World Cup to show until 1965. But after that one astrological patch seemed to have missed the bus—the patch between 1968 and 1971.

  I knew this patch was important because in the UEFA Euro, which is the second most important football tournament in the world, the 1964-born Jürgen Klinsmann had won, followed by the 1968-born Didier Deschamps and the 1971-born Theodoros Zagorakis. The 1968-born Didier had won both a Euro and a World Cup. Astrologically speaking, 1971 was an important year without a doubt. I was surprised to see that the important patch between 1968 and 1971 hadn’t produced a World Cup winner in cricket. I wondered why.

  This patch 1968–71 was one when Uranus was in exaltation similar to 1980–82. I didn’t know that Uranus could sometimes strike in the most unexpected ways.

  India won the inaugural T20 World Cup in 2007 under the Uranian, Dhoni, when Uranus was in its own house. The very next year, in 2008, Uranus created another magic. It was still transiting its own house, Aquarius, and was responsible for creating another innovative, unique venture which transformed the way cricket or, for that matter, any sports, was played in India—the Indian Premier League (IPL).

  You may call him a maverick or brash and arrogant, but Lalit Modi, the first IPL commissioner, should be really given credit for creating this extraordinary spectacle, loosely modelled upon the football Premier Leagues of Europe, with its own innovative spins and frills, which make it one of the most watched sports tournaments in the world.

  To know the longevity and scale of any entity, you need to know the date of its establishment. The extraordinary success of this cash-rich league can be attributed to the fantastic date of its launch. On 18th April 2008, the sun, Venus and Planet-X were in exaltation, and Jupiter and Uranus were in their own houses. Five planets in strong positions, what else could one ask for?

  The early hiccups and teething troubles occurred due to the troublemaking Uranus being in its own house. The various cases of money laundering, betting and spot fixing can also be attributed to the rebellious, volatile planet. However, Jupiter will continue to make the IPL larger; the sun and Venus will make it prosper and Planet-X will give it a long-lasting legacy. Scandals and upheavals may come and go, but the Indian Premier League is here to stay.

  When I saw the date of birth of the IPL (18th April 2008), I was pretty excited and knew that this event was going to be huge. I thought I should make a prediction about it. I came in touch with Lalit Modi and told him that the event was going to be a massive hit. Besides our interaction over his horoscope, where I hinted at the various challenges he might undergo during the next few years, I also happened to tell him about the most probable winner of the inaugural IPL tournament. He was surprised when I said it would be Rajasthan Royals. They were the humble underdogs and I had predicted that the team would win.

  Even as the IPL was launched, I needed to do an important exercise. Mentally, I needed to slot the IPLs in terms of importance, in comparison to the other tournaments, to know how powerful a captain’s horoscope should be to win it. When I realised that the IPL was here to stay, what struck me was that the winner of each IPL tournament would have to have a brilliant horoscope. In the order of importance, I put the IPL in the third place, after the World Cup and the T20 World Cup. Now that is really huge.

  It meant that the captains with horoscopes next to the best, captains whose charts showed them fall just short of winning a World Cup, would be the ones who would win an IPL.

  With this idea in mind, I started looking at the various team captains. One could make out immediately that MS Dhoni had the best chart amongst the captains. But the question was, could he win it again after having won a World Cup just six months earlier in September 2007? Maybe not. There was probably another captain who had as good a horoscope as Dhoni’s, or perhaps a notch lower than his and still had some karmic quota of success left. Also, as this IPL was a new tournament, and was being ruled by Uranus, this player also had to have Uranus in a prominent position in his chart. Who was he?

  I zeroed in on Shane Warne.

  Shane Warne was called the best captain Australia never had. He had excellent leadership skills; he was innovative; he was a great at his trade, but he hadn’t won anything as a captain and, more importantly, had Uranus in exaltation in his chart just like Dhoni. He was the man!

  Shane Warne and Rajasthan Royals won the inaugural IPL as I had predicted to Mr Modi.

  Every planetary spell gets its due. They have to! One patch that had strong enough planets in it, but hadn’t produced a World Cup winner was 1969–71. There were no T20 World Cups available to the gentlemen born then, but the new format in 2008 paved the way for the players born in these years to win some laurels too. The first two winners of the IPL belonged to the birth years 1969 and 1971, Shane Warne and Gilchrist respectively. The planets finally gave their due to these years.

  Since then I have been observing an amazing phenomenon in the IPL. The tournament is only won by players (captains) with fantastic horoscopes. You need to be the best of the best to win it; the crème-de-la-crème of the lot. Look at the list!

  Shane Warne

  Adam Gilchrist

  MS Dhoni: Thrice

  Gautam Gambhir: Twice

  Rohit Sharma: Thrice

  David Warner

  If Shane Warne was the greatest captain Australia never had, Gilchrist, too, was one of the greatest ever who never captained Australia. David Warner, again, had an extraordinary horoscope and was marching towards greatness before the Sandpaper Gate felled him. Gautam Gambhir and Rohit Sharma were two players who had all the qualities to be great captains, but couldn’t lead their country as they were born during a time when the regular captain was in complete control and could not be replaced. Gautam Gambhir was a 1981-born against a 1981-born Dhoni and Rohit Sharma was a 1987-born against a 1986/87-born Virat Kohli.

  I had picked out Gautam Gambhir[4], Rohit Sharma[5] and David Warner[6] to win the IPLs much before they actually did so just like Shane Warne. It is very simple. Pick t
he guy with the best horoscope after Dhoni!

  Well, the worry in this whole IPL tamasha is that when someone like a Gautam Gambhir or a Rohit Sharma wins it, ironically enough, they dilute their karmic quota of success (since IPL is relatively less important than a World Cup).

  One big sigh of relief from the Indian perspective is that Virat Kohli has not yet won the IPL despite umpteen tries for his club team, the Royal Challengers Bangalore. At least, not till this book went to press. My apologies to all Bangalore fans, but I wish he doesn’t win an IPL ever. Let him win one, if at all, after he has won a World Cup for India. What say?

  7.

  Saint Iker and Captain Cool

  29th June 2008. Mumbai.

  My new organisation was located in the busy Lower Parel area. The many events that happened over the next five years make me wonder if it was karma at play that I joined this company in 2008. It opened whole new vistas for me, directly and indirectly. The region where my office was located was packed with all types of media houses—from print to radio to TV.