CRICKET IN MADRAS: BRIEF HISTORY

                                                           CHAPTER 1

The earliest patrons of cricket (and other modern sport) in India were the British army, with the soldiers eager to find a cure for homesickness in the games they pursued in the sun. In Madras, for instance, the Island Ground was the earliest home of cricket, dating from the late 18th century or the early 19th.

Though initially inferior to the Englishman in the game, the native cricketer in time became skilful enough to beat him, especially in the annual Presidency Match (1915-1952) between Europeans and Indians in Madras, and the Triangular (which eventually grew into the Pentangular) in Bombay.

In their efforts to popularise cricket, the British had a strong ally in the princely states. It was the princes and maharajas and nawabs who actively supported cricketers by placing them in their payroll and enabling them to pursue the sport without the anxiety of having to earn a living outside the game. They also tended to bankroll the game on a much larger scale. The Maharaja of Porbandar must have financed India’s first official tour of England in 1932. Even a cursory glance at his tour statistics will reveal the meagre extent of his accomplishment as a cricketer. He did actually score a run on the tour (two runs, in fact) to justify his inclusion in the team and appointment as captain.

This is what Martin Williamson writes of Porbandar’s contribution to cricket:

"The Maharaja of Porbandar assumed the title as ruler of the small state of Kathiawar on the death of his father in 1908 aged seven, ascending to the throne in 1920. A keen cricketer, he was handicapped by being almost useless. Despite that, he was picked to captain the All-India side on their first major tour of England in 1932 when the Maharaja of Patiala had to withdraw through illness. It was considered necessary for a prince to lead the side, and so Porbandar was appointed. He acknowledged his limitations, playing in only four of the tour matches and handing over the captaincy for India’s first Test to CK Nayudu. He scored two runs on the whole trip, provoking the quite justified comment that he owned more Rolls Royces than he had made runs. He played only one more first-class match on his return to India."

In his book Patrons, Players and the Crowd: The Phenomenon of Indian Cricket, Richard Cashman devotes a chapter to the Indian princes who indulged in sport, including cricket. Quoting HT Wickham of the Indian Police Service, he describes the shenanigans of the rajas and maharajas, and the way some of them personalised the rules of the game.

On the cricketing adventures of the Maharaja of Kashmir, he says, “It didn’t matter which side was batting, his team or ours. He was padded by two attendants and gloved by two more, somebody carried his bat, and he walked to the wicket looking very dignified, very small and with an enormous turban on his head. In one of the matches I happened to be bowling and my first ball hit the stumps, but the wicket keeper, quick as lightning, shouted ‘No Ball’, and the match went on."

Down south, fiefdoms like Vizianagaram and Venkatagiri were well known for the patronage and support these princes and kings extended to cricket and other sport. According to one probably apocryphal tale about a fast bowler maharaja, he stood near the umpire in his grand cricket flannels, as a professional bowler – one of the king’s lackeys – came thundering down towards the batsman in a long run-up and handed over the ball like a relay runner passing the baton. The maharaja was of course very skilled in grabbing the ball from the relay runner and delivering it in one fell swoop. The batsman, even if he was one of the best in the region, usually did the politically correct thing, by getting beaten by the sheer pace of the king’s bowling.

Patiala, in Punjab, Indore in what is now Madhya Pradesh, and Baroda in present day Gujarat, were among the states where cricketers found a safe haven in princely patronage. In Hyderabad in the south, though the Nizam himself was not keen on sport, the nawabs Moin-ud-Dowla and Behram-ud-Dowla as well as a certain Ghulam Ali were, and the trophies they donated included the Moin-ud-Dowla Gold Cup, which for decades, was a national level tournament, and a much anticipated season opener.

Ranjitsinhji or Ranji, the Jam Saheb of Nawanagar, and his nephew Duleepsinhji as well as Iftikhar Ali Khan, the Nawab of Pataudi, all played for England, each of them scoring a hundred on Test debut. Pataudi went on to lead India as well, while his princely predecessors did not play for India.