He fought fire with fire..

The Indian team decided to fight fire with fire when Australians sledged them

The only mantra to improve English communication skills is to keep learning new stuff continuously. You cannot be complacent – the whole point of starting every post with such a message is to keep you brimming with motivation 🙂

Fight fire with fire – well isn’t the meaning pretty clear. At least the literal meaning. I mean if someone throws fire at you, you too throw fire at him.

What’s the extended meaning? If the opponent curses you, you curse him. If he criticizes you in public, you too criticize him in public. If he fights a law suit, you too do the same. You fight your opponent with the same methods that he is using. That’s fighting fire with fire.

Let’s take some examples:

1. When Arvind Kejriwal leveled charges of corruption against Robert Vadra, the government decided to fight fire with fire and set out its party spokespersons and some senior ministers to deliver a high voltage defense.
2. When Australian cricket team kept on misbehaving with the Indian players in the name of sledging, the Indian players too decided to fight fire with fire. That’s when the series became a high voltage contest.
3. After some initial miscalculations, Indian army realized the extent and depth of inflitration by the Pakistanis in Kargil. They decided to fight fire with fire. Several infantry batallions were then deployed and Air Force and heavy artillery too was used to deadly effect.

Fighting fire with fire means to repay in the same coin – the tone being more aggressive.

Let’s close with some more examples:

1. When I complained against the exorbitant charges, the builder started shouting at me. I too decided to fight fire with fire. I outshouted him and told him that I would cancel the registration and would also get five of my friends to cancel the registration who had booked flats in the society.
2.  In the face of stiff competition we would have to fight fire with fire. If they slash the prices, we would have to do that too.