According to Suphal Kafle of Ujjayalo Network, that offers live SMS updates, around 33, 300 SMSes were received in the match between England and India alone. “We received more SMSes from people living outside the capital,” he said. [break]
Kafle further added that they normally receive around 8,000 SMSes in a day when there is a single match and more than 15,000 SMSes when there are two games.
Kapil Dhakal, who uses GPRS to go get regular updates of the world cup, said the increased power cuts have played a spoilsport. “The updates are often slow because mobile network is also poor.”
Anju Sharma, an avid cricket fan supporting Sri Lanka in the ongoing world cup, regrets not being able to watch the full innings of her favorite team.
“In the last Cricket World Cup, I had watched all the matches played by Sri Lanka but this time around I have been able to watch a even a single complete innings,” Sharma rued.
The mega event, organized once in four years, is being held in the neighboring South Asian countries -- India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. According to news agencies, one of the host nations, Bangladesh, has cut down load shedding hours for the World Cup. However, there is no sign of improvement in Nepal´s load shedding routine. The fans have to be lucky to watch their favorite bowler and batsmen play.
The Sri Lanka fan Sharma has a plan to watch rest of the Cricket World Cup matches in restaurants. “I´m looking out for public screening or restaurants to watch rest of the matches played by Sri Lanka,” she lamented.
A cricket match runs much longer than a football match, which makes screening in big screens at public places or restaurants difficult. The backup power for television or big screens does not support full length of the game.
BM Thapa, manager of Ezer Lounge Café, said that his café had screened all the football matches on televisions powered by generators but he has plans of screening only the knockout stage matches of the Cricket World Cup. “The Cricket World Cup has less craze than the World Cup football and cricket relatively runs longer. We will screen only the knockout matches,” said Thapa.
National cricketer Basanta Regmi said, “The Nepal Electricity Authority should think about the mega event and make some arrangement till the world cup concludes.”
However, NEA has no such plans. Chrinjivi Poudel, an official at NEA said they have received numerous calls to provide electricity till the world cup lasts but said it was simply not possible. “We know that Cricket World Cup is a mega sporting event but we cannot provide electricity,” said Poudel.
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