Profile: Newsmaker
“I have seen a medicine, That’s able to breathe life into a stone, quicken a rock, and make you dance canary. With spritely fire and motion,” — All’s Well That Ends Well, William Shakespeare.
In life as in a work of art, Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar is like that potent medicine that breathed life into cricket almost magically and to a greater degree with his Mozart-like passion. His life is to an astonishing extent the product of the Darwinian theory of “channelising aggression to a purposeful end.”
Born into a middle-class Mumbai household, he grew up in Dadar Shivaji Park. A student from Sharadashram Vidyamandir (High School), the young Sachin was quick to lend glory to international cricket. The game, known for its glorious uncertainties, became Sachin’s life. Under the able guidance of his cricketing mentor, Ramakant Achrekar, he rode to mindblowing success. Early this week, he took a totally improbable entry into democracy’s gilded hall when he was sworn in as a Rajya Sabha MP.
It is anybody’s guess whether Sachin can improve the sports world or the state of cricket, and his nomination to Rajya Sabha may have raised a few curious eyebrows. The reticent batsman, who silenced his critics with his willow time and again, has an uphill task this time. In cricket, as much as in life, there is time for entry and exit and one cannot perhaps go on eternally. Sachin’s stint in politics may bring sports into the limelight of parliamentary decision making without playing politics. It may also give him the courage to shed the cricketing gear. But, that’s something only time will tell.
Cricket is all about statistics, and Tendulkar has a series of records to make him the greatest batsman of cricket ever. In November 2011, he became the first batsman to score 15,000 runs in Test cricket. He is also the first player to score 10,000 runs in one-day internationals. On February 24, 2010, Tendulkar became the first man to score a double century (200*) in an ODI against South Africa. Playing for over two decades, he also holds the world record for playing the highest number of Tests and ODIs.
His latest triumph was his 100th century during an ODI against Bangladesh in Dhaka. That is 29 centuries more than the man in the second place on the list, Australia’s Ricky Ponting. Sachin, 38, who started playing at the age of 16, has 100 centuries, 51 scored in Tests, to his credit. Nearly 22 summers after the legend arrived on a caparisoned horse, laden with battle honours, he is now the $2 million man of Indian Premier League (IPL), synonymous with the short format, 20-over match.
The curly-haired, cherubic boy who was determined to avoid the usual traps in life, with its attendant cynicism, worked as an adult workhorse from Lord’s to Lahore and Jamaica to Johannesburg to chase the rainbow. For someone who has been blessed to achieve nearly everything he wanted on the cricket field, the nation is touched to see the calm, collected young man, almost god-like in his ability to remain untouched by applause and adulation.
meghnamaiti@mydigitalfc.com
“I have seen a medicine, That’s able to breathe life into a stone, quicken a rock, and make you dance canary. With spritely fire and motion,” — All’s Well That Ends Well, William Shakespeare.
In life as in a work of art, Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar is like that potent medicine that breathed life into cricket almost magically and to a greater degree with his Mozart-like passion. His life is to an astonishing extent the product of the Darwinian theory of “channelising aggression to a purposeful end.”
Born into a middle-class Mumbai household, he grew up in Dadar Shivaji Park. A student from Sharadashram Vidyamandir (High School), the young Sachin was quick to lend glory to international cricket. The game, known for its glorious uncertainties, became Sachin’s life. Under the able guidance of his cricketing mentor, Ramakant Achrekar, he rode to mindblowing success. Early this week, he took a totally improbable entry into democracy’s gilded hall when he was sworn in as a Rajya Sabha MP.
It is anybody’s guess whether Sachin can improve the sports world or the state of cricket, and his nomination to Rajya Sabha may have raised a few curious eyebrows. The reticent batsman, who silenced his critics with his willow time and again, has an uphill task this time. In cricket, as much as in life, there is time for entry and exit and one cannot perhaps go on eternally. Sachin’s stint in politics may bring sports into the limelight of parliamentary decision making without playing politics. It may also give him the courage to shed the cricketing gear. But, that’s something only time will tell.
Cricket is all about statistics, and Tendulkar has a series of records to make him the greatest batsman of cricket ever. In November 2011, he became the first batsman to score 15,000 runs in Test cricket. He is also the first player to score 10,000 runs in one-day internationals. On February 24, 2010, Tendulkar became the first man to score a double century (200*) in an ODI against South Africa. Playing for over two decades, he also holds the world record for playing the highest number of Tests and ODIs.
His latest triumph was his 100th century during an ODI against Bangladesh in Dhaka. That is 29 centuries more than the man in the second place on the list, Australia’s Ricky Ponting. Sachin, 38, who started playing at the age of 16, has 100 centuries, 51 scored in Tests, to his credit. Nearly 22 summers after the legend arrived on a caparisoned horse, laden with battle honours, he is now the $2 million man of Indian Premier League (IPL), synonymous with the short format, 20-over match.
The curly-haired, cherubic boy who was determined to avoid the usual traps in life, with its attendant cynicism, worked as an adult workhorse from Lord’s to Lahore and Jamaica to Johannesburg to chase the rainbow. For someone who has been blessed to achieve nearly everything he wanted on the cricket field, the nation is touched to see the calm, collected young man, almost god-like in his ability to remain untouched by applause and adulation.
meghnamaiti@mydigitalfc.com
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