The Week India — November 12, 2017

(^70) THE WEEK Š NOVEMBER 12, 2017
BOOKS
BY NEERU BHATIA

R

ajdeep Sardesai’s Democracy’s XI: The

Great Indian Cricket Story is the latest

attempt to chronicle India’s cricketing

renaissance through a ‘playing eleven’. It

is packed with anecdotes—some well known, some

not—and is by and large a successful attempt at con-

densing the legends’ journeys and contextualising

them not just with cricket but also with the sociopo-

litical and economic conditions.

The book is a personalised view of everything

Indian cricket. Sardesai, the son of the late Dilip

Sardesai, has had an insider’s view because of his

surname and because he has played and followed

the game with great passion. To his credit, he has

managed to interact with the cricketers featured in

the book, and not shied away from discussing contro-

versial topics with them. Excerpts from an interview:

How diffi cult was it to separate the father from the

cricketer and write on him?

I really cannot differentiate. It’s diffi cult to separate

an individual who you have grown up with from

his persona as a cricketer. I just thought I should

be honest to him and perhaps that led me to look

at his weaknesses, whether it was fi elding, the fact

that he lived his life in a manner where he suffered

a lot in his health and fi nancially. I also had to re-

fl ect his personal side. The lines got blurred in that

chapter but I have been honest when I wrote that

he’s not an all-time great, but neither is this XI of all-

time greats. This is about people I knew well and the

times that they lived embodied a certain spirit and

part of landmark moment. You can’t deny my father

the 1971 landmark moment [the tour of the West In-

dies; India won the Test series 1-0].

How did this idea ferment?

It has been fermenting in my mind for a long time. I

have watched how cricket has grown—earlier linked

to politics, now to commerce. I thought let’s try and

look at cricket through the prism of other things

happening in India. It took me 18 months to write

this. I am not a full-time cricket journalist. It’s even

more diffi cult to connect with cricketers than politi-

cians. I now feel really sorry for cricket reporters. I

waited for M.S. Dhoni for almost a year; six months

to get through to Virat Kohli.

You left aside the early legends.

Mihir Bose has written the history of Indian cricket,

particularly the early period. If I had covered them

it would have been all secondary information. I

wanted to do it based on primary information I had

gained. So I thought the late 50s is a good point to

start from because it is my father’s generation.

The incident of Sunil Gavaskar saving a Muslim

couple from a rioting mob in Mumbai, I believe you

reported that story for a national daily.

That story has always stayed with me. We always re-

member Gavaskar for what he achieved on the crick-

et fi eld. What he did on that day—saving a family’s

life—is remarkable. Gavaskar has this dimension in

him. We all think he is this steely, fi erce character

who is obsessed with run making and money, but

there is also a Gavaskar who in that period reached

out and that story must be told.

The book reveals that the differences between

Bishan Singh Bedi and Gavaskar still exists.

I interviewed Bedi. He said a few things about

Gavaskar. Then I went back to Gavaskar. He got

angry and asked if the book was about him and Bedi.

He likes to put all responses on email. The whole

Interview/ Rajdeep Sardesai

Virat Kohli has a supreme

understanding of the game

SANJAY AHLAWAT