The problem for high profile figures is that the cost of saying no to the person in power asking them to do something, far outweighs the cost of agreeing to do it. I’m not justifying his actions, I never cared about cricket or his ‘God’ status or whatever. It would make sense for people not to ask for foreign interference, if there was even a shred of dialogue/feedback or interaction that the ruling government was ready to provide. But this habit of bringing sweeping changes to people’s lives without any room for dialogue (demonetisation, CAA etc) is not the sign of a democratic government but a democratically elected dictatorship. I understand the difficulty for the government to get anything done by appealing to common logic but the money being wasted on eccentricities could be used for information campaigns etc to reach out to the stakeholders. This government is appearing to be very similar to colonial powers, who ruled this vast country and its gigantic population by using proxies, which Sachin Tendulkar has become, despite all his achievements, gets a call in the middle of the night and has no choice but to say yes. Because the cost of saying no is to come under the glare of a certain Amit Shah, whose son has a job, which even the cricket God would envy, without having touched a bat in his life.