When Kohli nodded

Shoukat and his group drew the Indian cricketing star’s picture on the sand and he loved it

The Pakistan Cricket Board, the Board of Control for Cricket in India and the governments of both countries always seem to be at the throat of each other.

These two countries have the fiercest rivalry in the field of cricket. Just a couple of weeks back, the two teams collided in the T20 World Cup in Australia, where India’s batting star Virat Kohli snatched a win from the jaws of Pakistan. After his incredible effort, he did not receive any hate from the neighbours, instead, people admired him even more.

As a gesture of love, Sameer Shoukat, a young sand artist from Gadani, along with his team created a giant portrait of the Indian batting machine on the sand.

When Pakistan pacer Shahnawaz Dahani met India’s former skipper, he showed him his portrait, which he loved. Later, the right-arm pacer posted a picture of Kohli holding the phone with his portrait opened on it, captioned, “This is for you Gaddani boys. Virat was very happy for this & says thank you to your whole group & he really loved it.”

It was a huge moment for the group and Shoukat, who cold not believe that it reached Kohli.

“I still cannot believe Kohli saw my art and appreciated it,” said Shoukat while talking to Bol News. “I don’t know Dahani personally, but what he did for me is commendable, not only does Kohli now knows what I and my team did but the rest of the world is also interested.”

As a gesture to thank the Multan Sultans’ star, Shoukat and the Rashidi Artists created a portrait of him on the sand, which the pacer also acknowledged.

Moreover, they also drew Pakistan captain Babar Azam, who has not been in the best form of his life. They believe that players that are not performing also need to be supported.

“Our next portrait is of captain Babar Azam, usually people only praise cricketers who are performing well and playing good knocks,” he said ahead of the semi-final against New Zealand. “What we want to do is appreciate our captain and remind him that he can bounce back from any bad patch.”

The 18-year-old shared that he and his group have been making these portraits on the sand for the past three years and now finally their work has been recognised.

“We have been making sand portraits for over three years now,” he mentioned. “There are six members in the group and my elder brother manages it. We take about two to three hours to make a portrait now, but earlier it used to take us days.”

Shoukat enlightened that three members of his group work on a single portrait and before making the final version of it, they practice it for days.

“We create portraits [for practice and final pieces] in spaces that have a high vantage point so that they can use the height as an advantage to go observe the art and then fix any mistakes that have been made,” he maintained.

The talented artist was not interested in it initially when his brother first started this group. In fact, he stated that he got involved in it because his brother forced him to do so. However, as time passed, he started liking it.

Though the group has caught the attention of many and their art is being applauded, it is not providing them with any kind of financial assistance. To earn the living, he and his brothers depend on fishing, which is not a stable income either.

“We are six brothers and none of us has any stable source of income,” he said. “My brothers fish and sell to run the household, but that solely depends on the way the tide turns, sometimes they come empty-handed.

“Our art is something we do out of love. The truth is we have no financial support coming in from either government or private sector.”

The Rashidi Artists is a group of financially deprived young boys, who are passionate about their work only. They cannot afford a drone to shoot their piece of art from a height, so they depend on high vantage points to capture it through a lens.

“We travel five kilometres to our vantage point to create art because we don’t have a drone, if we did we would barely have to walk 50 steps to the beach from our house,” Shoukat said, adding that the weather also plays a big role in this art.

“Sometimes there’s high tide and there isn’t enough space for the art, other times the skies are too cloudy or it could rain so we have to wait that for it to get normal,” he said.