These pains you feel are messengers. Listen to them.

"Flattering to deceive" is a term Indians who grew up in the 1960s and 1970s are all too familiar with.

The term, though English, has found its way into at least two dozen Indian languages, albeit in translated form.

It started with hockey (sorry, field hockey, in which India has won eight Olympic golds), shifting to badminton and tennis. The Indians were lucky to regain lost glory in field hockey in 1975 when they won the World Cup in Kuala Lumpur.