LAHORE/ ISLAMABAD - The moment Shahid Afridi's shot off Ravichandran Ashwin's bowling soared over the boundary ropes, the people of the provincial capital went delirious with joy as fireworks and gunshots were blazing in the air. Seconds after Pakistan team won the nail-biting match against arch-rivals India, people started aerial firing across the city as per reports from various parts of the city including commercial and residential vicinities. A large number of youngsters came out of their houses for celebrating victory over its India.
Fireworks too lighted the sky as the country erupted in joy and the citizens danced on the streets and roads with music being played in the background. A good number of people including women, children and youngsters, started gathering at various intersections of The Mall especially at Regal Chowk and Faisal Chowk, in front of Punjab assembly.
On this occasion, mostly youngsters’ groups appeared suddenly at some major roads of the city on foot, motorcycles and cars for participating in the gathering of the citizens at these specific places of the city for celebrating victory in just after 10 minutes of the match which ended with the great victory of Pakistan cricket team.
The people were expressing their joyful feelings by chanting different slogans of ‘Pakistan Zindabad (long live)’, “Shahid Afrid Zindabad’ Boom Boom Afridi etc. The youngsters also were dancing on the music, played in the cars on high volumes.
Like in most cities, there was less than normal traffic on the roads in the provincial capital during the time when the match was being played. But suddenly people came out of their homes and gathered at different intersections of the city and the gatherings caused traffic jams on these roads and the traffic remained jammed for some hours as the people continued celebrating the victory of the cricket team till late at night. Besides the youngsters, a large number of traders and shopkeepers also came out of their shops and started chanting slogans of Pakistan Zindabad. Many of them also were hoisting flag of Pakistan with chanting slogans and dancing on music with joy. Immediately after the victory, people of different areas especially the shopkeepers distributed sweets and cakes among the people. Special screenings were also organised in various restaurants in Lahore where youngsters watched the encounter on giant screens.
TWIN CITIES WENT WILD: Pakistan cricket team pulled off sensational one-wicket victory against arch-rivals India in the crucial Asia Cup match on Sunday as soon as Afridi hit the winning six, spectators thronged Rawalpindi-Islamabad roads and started celebrate the moment. It was a carnival like situation as young and old were chanting slogans and dancing on the Main Murree Road and different main markets of the federal capital, sweets were distributed and people gave congratulations to each other on defeating proud loud mouth Indians. Quite emotional scenes were also witnessed as old male and female fans were crying in joy and tears of jubilation were pouring out from their eyes. While sharing their views over the moon spectators in their late 50s, described the victory as one of the finest moments of their lives. Few of them went ahead and said we had taken sweet revenge from the Indians of dividing Pakistan and Bangladesh into two. There was hardly any space available on the roads as crowds had occupied all the main roads and the twin cities witnessed such scenes after a very long time. One of the youngsters, Pervaiz while sharing his views termed Afridi as the God Father of Pakistan cricket. “I was a long life fan of Afridi but after watching his poor performances on consistent basis I stopped watching matches altogether. But after a long time, I once again switched on my television at that stage Pakistan had lost 6-wickets already. Hoping may be Afrdi pulled off sensational victory, I sticked on to TV and Afrid did not disappoint this time. I am very luck to witnessed such an innings of Afrdi,” Pervaiz detailed.
There were wild celebrations also witnessed at The Nation offices in Islamabad, as staffers distributed sweets and congratulated each other on tremendous victory.