Contract bridge is a good option on Sundays

Addiction to cards has been labeled as an evil and, in Bengali, there is a saying ‘tash, dabah, pasha, shakal karma nasha’ – this means the three vices that affect one’s normal working are cards, chess and the game of dice a-la Shakuni mama in the Mahabharata.
I had not become an addict as such but loved a game of bridge.
I began with auction bridge – that also due to circumstances. I had lost my father and so had a close friend of mine. One evening, as I was sitting with him, his brother-in-law came along. He invited me to a game of auction bridge and when I explained that I did not know how to play it, he brought out a pack of cards and explained.

Then we sat down to a game. It needed a foursome, so my friend’s wife teamed up with her brother and I and my friend got together. That was the beginning. My friend is now settled in Kolkata as is his brother-in-law.
Anyway, later, I switched over to contract bridge and would have regular sessions on Sunday afternoons in my quarter. In those days, mobile phones were unheard of and we would fix the schedule while marketing.
One fine day my friends invited me to accompany them to a night session of contract bridge. It used to be held in the Mitra Vihar club on Saturday nights and would begin after dinner at 10pm. The games went on till early hours of Sunday. Since it was duplicate bridge, it offered a level playing field to all and no one could grumble about bad break of cards or complain of any hanky-panky tricks.
I had, in the meantime, linked up with a regular partner and had devised a bidding system of our own. We wrote the details on a sheet of paper and would leave it on the table for our opponents to refer in case of doubt. Those who played by the standard bidding systems of Goran or Precision, just made a mention of that during the play. But, me and my friend devised out own system – hence had to table it as per tradition.
After gaining experience at Mitra Vihar and then at other venues like the State Bank club in Nashik, we decided to participate in the state level championship. Our HAL Recreation Club was kind enough to sponsor two teams and, it was an experience that I can never forget. (to be continued …)

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Understanding the intricacies of playing duplicate bridge

Contract bridge was an indoor game and a new attraction for me and some other Bengalis like me. The duplicate bridge version was really attractive. Many Bengalis were experts at it and could guess the lay of cards with tremendous ease and accuracy.
It all depended on the bidding of your partner and of the opponents and in trying to interpret the meaning of the bids and what they wanted to convey. Even silence at the bidding conveyed some message.
To begin the bidding, one must necessarily have at least 13 counts in the 13 cards he held – his bid should let the other players at the table understand a rough distribution. That would help the others to make an assessment of how the cards were distributed taking into account his own holdings.

Different conventions were followed – like Goran which depended on the minimum total count in hand and identifying the preferred bid based on the highest number of cards of a particular suit. In case there was no specific suit to bid, one could begin with a No Trump indicating a scattered layout.
Then there was the Precision bid – here one had to memorize different bids based on the distribution like 4-4-4-1, or 5-4-3-1 or 5-5-3-0, 7-5-0-0 etcetera.
Another bid was the One Club bid – it meant a scattered distribution with minimum count and the exact suit would be decided after getting the response of the partner.
Anyway – I and my partner decided on a bid system of our own. We had named it GHOTAL – GHO from Ghose (my name) and TAL (from the name of my partner Talapatra).
When it came to duplicate bridge, there were innovations – namely, an open room and a closed room. A team usually consisted of four members who played each deal with the same set of cards. Only, the declarers in the open room would become defenders in the closed room.
Once the cards were dealt, the set would be duplicated by each player and inserted into a specially designed receptacle and taken to the closed room. While the open room was open to public, the entry in the closed room was restricted to only the persons who directed the game. No ne else was allowed.
By playing with the same set of cards, anomalies regarding bad distribution were eliminated because if a N-S declarer arrives at a certain contract and if the opponents arrive at a better contract in the closed room, obviously it was a plus point for them. The final result would reflect that.(to be continued …)

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Sunday afternoons meant Contract Bridge in Officers Club

There was a time in Nashik when there were several individuals who had a common interest in playing contract bridge. They belonged to not only HAL but hailed from related Government agencies associated with HAL. A few of them were diehard bridge players and they took the initiative to launch the Sunday afternoon versions. There are various games of cards from Patience, played by loners, to teen-patti which is nothing but gambling to bridge where the players are tested to their limits.

In bridge also there are two types – the auction bridge and the contract bridge. Both versions of bridge involve four players and a deck of 52-cards but, contract bridge is more sophisticated. Even its scorecard. The chart where the score is maintained ensures equal vulnerability for both the teams.
Anyway, the Sunday afternoons transformed into four to five hours of brain racking exercises to fulfil the contracts of 3-No Trumps, or a Low Slam or a Grand Slam (yes, GS had been contracted and successfully met!)
The game kept every player mentally alert and on tenterhooks. The players included senior managers like the GM, AGMs, and DGMs as well many of their subordinates. On these occasions, all of them sipped tea from paper cups, munched biscuits and, at the end of the session, distributed prizes.
There would be bonhomie all around and, even though there would be arguments between partners and heated exchanges to justify a particular move, the players would come together again the next week. (to be continued…)

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Nashik, a tourist center with links to the Mahabharata

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