Information Madness

He is still the greatest as he turned 70 on 17^th January this year. Muhammad Ali is still floating like a butterfly and boxing against time gracefully fighting off Parkinson’s disease. Right now, he is leading on the scorecard. His opponents have all faded away. He has been known as the champ of champs, icon of icons and he has now joined the ranks of septuagenarians.

Most men at his age will feel parts of their body weaken. Ali’s body began shutting down on him about thirty years back. He has been a silent witness to his own greatness in these past three decades as he battles medical odds.

Muhammad Ali’s status as a political and social activist takes him ahead of Pele, Michael Jordan, Roger Federer and Jack Nicklaus. He has gone through real dark times with Parkinson’s disease and the slow damage to the head caused during his ring days. Talking of the boxing ring, he brought super human qualities there when he beat Sonny Liston and he never looked back after that.

ITV has screened a documentary recently when Muhammad Ali came to England as Cassius Clay in 1963 to fight the legendary Cooper. The heavyweight era of Joe Frazier and George Foreman followed later. Joe Frazier passed away last year. Very few people have forgotten those nights at the Madison Square Garden and Las Vegas.

The reason why Muhammad Ali is still famous is because he shares a chapter in the history of the 1960s with Martin Luther King and Malcolm X. He found his purpose and voice in the reflections of public fascination. Boxing brought him up and it also brought him down. He rarely found an opponent that he considered to be superior to him. Now, he is boxing against time and he is just ahead on points count.