 Inder and Chander
D Inder Raj and C R Chandran--Inder and Chander to their friends--formed one of the most devastating opening pairs I had seen in Hyderabad cricket. The two of them opened the innings for Andhra Bank in domestic competition in the seventies. Both were talented and aggressive and both loved to show off their shot making ability, often competing with each other in tempting fate with some outrageously risky strokes. The faster the bowler bowled the more powerfully they hit the ball. They usually gave Andhra Bank flying starts, even if they sometimes let down the side by getting out in quick succession, when a more cautious approach might have served the team’s cause better. Both could cut, pull, hook and drive on the up like the West Indies batsmen of the day, and fours and sixes galore flowed from their flashing blades. One memorable start they provided for Andhra Bank was against the touring Ceylon Tobacco Board XI, which had the pacy Ranjan Gunatilleke in its ranks. As the young tearaway charged in and hurled his express deliveries, the ball kept disappearing into the distant shrubbery beyond the boundary at the Osmania University ground.
They usually gave Andhra Bank flying starts, even if they let down the side by getting out in quick succession, when a more cautious approach might have served the team’s cause better. Both could cut, pull, hook and drive on the up like the West Indies batsmen of the day, and fours and sixes galore flowed from their flashing blades.
One memorable start they provided for Andhra Bank was against the touring Ceylon Tobacco Board XI, which had the pacy Ranjan Gunatilleke in its ranks. As the young tearaway charged in and hurled his express deliveries, the ball kept disappearing into the distant shrubbery beyond the boundary at the Osmania University ground.
Chandran was tall and well built, very athletic in early youth and tending to put on weight as he grew older and learnt to enjoy the good things in life. Like me, he was a vegetarian, a rarity in cricket circles, but loved the pleasures of high quality spirits. He was also a smoker and lighted a cigarette invariably with a flourish. A great fan of Amitabh Bachchan, he had the height and good looks to make a good imitation of the great film star, though he resembled another hero of the times, Vinod Khanna, more, especially after he started wearing glasses. During the long evenings on cricket tours, he frequently entertained his teammates with his mimicry of cricket commentators, John Arlott in particular.
Chandran was also a very useful medium pace bowler, with an ability to move the ball both ways. Quite fast when he was young, he later slowed down and concentrated on the fine art of swing and seam. In one unforgettable spell of bowling on the then matting surface at the Railway Recreation ground at Secunderabad, he had the stylish Sultan Salim weaving and ducking to his short pitched deliveries. One of his bouncers flew straight and high over Salim’s head off the handle and descended on the stumps even as the batsman was trying to obstruct short leg from reaching the catch.
Inder was short and slight in stature and had the whippy reflexes of the small made. He could bowl useful medium pace but his real forte in bowling was leg spin. He toured England with the Indian Schoolboys in 1967 and performed reasonably well. He was one of the more attractive batsmen of his period and a very attacking leg spinner, capable of deceit through flight and variation. One trait he shared with his mate Chandran was a sharp cricketing brain and superb analytical ability. Both could dissect an opponent’s strengths and weaknesses and think out excellent strategies to get out of tight corners in matches. Both were relatively lazy, and could easily have achieved greater success than they did had they applied themselves the way some of their les talented peers did. (Chandran once completed a cross country run by rickshaw)!
Unfortunately, both led adventurous lives and both paid for it, getting a greater share of the rough end of the stick than they perhaps deserved. Chandran died young and Inder suffered some setbacks in his career. They have left a trail of wonderful memories with the entertaining brand of cricket they played and the warmth of their friendship.
V Ramnarayan
|
