Chiranth.
| Photo Credit: SPECIAL ARRANGEMENT

Jhathavedh Subramanyan of Kovai Kings in action at a TNPL match held at Natham.
| Photo Credit: G. KARTHIKEYAN

Miserly spell: Nirankar, who moved from Madhya Pradesh to Tamil Nadu to fuel his cricket dream, tightened the screws in the middle overs.
| Photo Credit: G. KARTHIKEYAN

New Delhi:

Cricketer R Ashwin’s recent remark that Hindi is not India’s national language but only an official language has been supported by BJP Tamil Nadu President Annamalai, who has said that it is a “language of convenience”. 

Attending a convocation ceremony at a private college near Chennai on Thursday, the Tamil Nadu-born cricketer had asked what language the students would like him to address them in. “English students in the house – give me a yay,” he said, getting a loud cheer in reply. He then said “Tamil” and got an even louder roar from the audience. When he said “Hindi”, however, there was total silence.

 “I thought I should say this. Hindi is not our national language; it is an official language,” he then said in Tamil.

Asked about the comments on Friday, Annamalai said Hindi was a “link language”. 

“Correct. It is not a national language, which Annamalai is also telling you. Not only my dear friend Ashwin has to say that… not only anybody… It is not the national language. It was a link language, it is a language of convenience… And nowhere am I saying or anybody is saying Hindi is the national language, which Ashwin ji is correct (sic),” he said.  

“Hindi imposition” has been a sensitive subject in Tamil Nadu and there have been several protests and campaigns in the state over the years. 

In October last year, Tamil Nadu Chief Minister and DMK chief Stalin MK had written to Prime Minister Narendra Modi about the Golden Jubilee Celebrations of Chennai Doordarshan being combined with Hindi Month Celebrations and said celebrating “such-Hindi language oriented events in non-Hindi speaking states” can be avoided.

“As you are aware, the Constitution of India does not accord national language status to any language. Hindi and English are used only for official purposes such as legislation, judiciary and communication between the Union government and state governments. In the circumstances, in a multilingual country like India, according special place to Hindi and celebrating Hindi Month in non-Hindi speaking States is seen as an attempt to belittle other languages,” Mr Stalin wrote.

Retirements come in stages, that’s the modern way. Not surprisingly, it is the lucrative franchise cricket that is the last to be let go. Ravichandran Ashwin will be seen in action at the IPL, and possibly even tennis ball cricket back home. He is already speaking of taking cricket to the terraces in Chennai. He is a cricket obsessive and will not turn down a chance to play.

He is also intelligent and articulate, and will become a media personality to reckon with. The temperament that might have denied him national captaincy — the refusal to suffer fools — can make him a success in the media. It is ironical that the very assets that are praised when you are successful — self-confidence, persistence, creativity, become negative qualities as your career winds down.

Letdown

But to retire in the middle of a series and fly back home? That is just not cricket. It was a letdown. Ashwin’s father might have let out the cat that everybody knew was in the bag by saying Ashwin felt humiliated at his treatment. This is understandable, but the implications of quitting now are many. It can be demoralising for teammates, it gives rise to unnecessary speculation, and most damaging of all, it deprives the team of a key player in the Tests remaining. Sydney is expected to help spin.

Mahendra Singh Dhoni retired in Australia a decade ago in the middle of a series. It wasn’t right then, this isn’t right now. Skipper Rohit Sharma saying “personal reasons” and requesting the player be left alone was either protecting Ashwin or protecting himself.

If the coach and captain told Ashwin he would not be picked again, that is ridiculous. Or perhaps there was a compelling reason back home. Notice how we are already in the realm of speculation. Whatever the cause, Indian cricket — and Ashwin — deserved better.

Last week in these columns we spoke about the lack of mentorship in India that sometimes leads young hopefuls astray. There is need for care and understanding at the other end of the career too. An exit interview might be valuable here. Top players in recent years, from Gundappa Vishwanath to Virender Sehwag have been allowed to fade away without a plan.

Ashwin’s place in history is assured as the finest of his tribe who had plenty of tricks in his bag as an all-rounder. Spin bowling is an intellectual activity, and the refusal to remain satisfied with what you have is the mark of someone playing not merely for his team, but for the sport itself.

Remarkably, Ashwin played all 65 Tests that India played at home since his debut, but only half the number India played in the ‘SENA’ countries (South Africa, England, New Zealand and Australia). His predecessor Harbhajan Singh played just over a third of the Tests India played in the SENA, so maybe it was the perception of their craft, not of their skill. Indian selectors tend to be hidebound in these matters, and precedents count for a lot.

Quintessential modern cricketer

Ashwin is the quintessential modern cricketer, in attitude and temperament. Self-aware to a great degree, he knew what was expected of him in each of the formats and was clear in his mind about what he expected from the game. India has a fine tradition of finger spinners, from Ghulam Ahmed, Erapalli Prasanna and Srinivas Venkataraghavan to Harbhajan and Ashwin. The last-named takes his place at the top of the pile for his ability to present new problems to the batter each time and the sense of joy he brought to his task.

But one question needs to be answered when the event is shorn of its emotional heft: Was it time to go? Ashwin will be 39 during before India’s next home Test series. In his last four Tests, he had ten wickets at 42. Crucially, India lost all four, three at home. These are not encouraging figures for a bowler who takes pride in his craft.

If something specific happened during the Australian tour to make Ashwin pack up and leave, we will know about that soon enough. Perhaps in the next volume of his excellent memoirs. Meanwhile let’s tip our hats to a modern great.

John Arlott said of the great English seamer Maurice Tate that he did not play cricket; he lived in it. The same might be said of Ravi Ashwin, who has retired, somewhat unexpectedly, aged thirty-eight.

He was born into the game — his parents Ravichandran and Chitra were obsessed with his career. He married the game — his wife now runs his cricket academy, Gen Next, and media company, Carrom Ball Media. He covers the world on his YouTube Channel, and is a compulsive communicator on Instagram. In amongst all this, he has harvested 765 international wickets and nearly 5000 runs.

Sometimes cricketers and their cricket are readily separable. Yet it was hard to imagine a conversation with this proud Madrasi that did not circle back to his passion and obsession. He did have other interests, I know. He liked movies, with a special affinity for the cult classic Chennai 6000028. It is, of course, about cricket.

To an outsider, this might make him sound a little….narrow? But there is what you’re interested in, and how you’re interested in it. Few cricketers can have explored the game to such a minute level. Sometimes you wonder whether Australia’s top players see cricket as getting in the way of their golf; they fondly nicknamed Mike Hussey, Ashwin’s Chennai Super Kings colleague, ‘Mr. Cricket’.

Life’s intelligent study

But Ashwin’s encyclopedism kind of makes you feel a little proud of cricket, that it could be subjected to a life’s intelligent study, and protective of it too. After all, nobody ever said to Einstein: ‘Gosh, Albert, do you reckon we could talk about something other than physics?’ Or of Steve Jobs: ‘Steve could be a really fun guy if he wasn’t so obsessed with the graphic user interface.’

The argument then becomes whether it is possible to be a genius in such a seemingly esoteric realm. To which the straight-forwardest retort is: cricket in India is anything but trivial. And even if it may be of lesser importance than the fate of nations, then, as Hazlitt observed in his immortal essay on Cavanagh the fives player, what of it?

“It may be said that there are things of more importance than striking a ball against a wall — there are things, indeed, that make more noise and do as little good, such as making war and peace, making speeches and answering them, making verses and blotting them, making money and throwing it away. But the game of fives is what no one despises who has ever played it.”

I commend the appreciations of Ashwin by Kartikeya Date, Jarrod Kimber and his amanuensis Sid Monga, while there has been an impressive range of tributes from CSK past players and I liked the gesture by Pat Cummins’ Australians too.

Different kind of memoir

But what has really enhanced my appreciation of Ashwin in recent times has been reading the coming-of-age memoir he published this year with Sid, I Have The Streets. By convention, cricket memoirs dispose of early life perfunctorily — usually in a chapter called ‘Early Life’ — with rites of passage like the first century, the first five-for etc. That’s not for Ashwin.

He takes you right back to his gully cricket days in Ramakrishnapuram 1st Street, where, for instance, he developed his batting technique of staying leg side of the ball, because he had no pads, and his aptitude for the pull shot, because there were windows straight. He executed his first Mankad, he tells us, aged twelve. Nobody blinked. No wonder he took a hard line later.

Ashwin was also twelve when he suffered his first career-threatening injury — a slipped left hip disc, entailing excruciating treatment. Rather than overstrain the hip, he learned to bat left-handed. He had an unusual, stork-like physique: a short torso, long legs. To adapt, he found a yoga guru. Not a naturally gainly fielder, he spent time teaching himself to slide in the outfield.

The book is particularly instructive in the matter of Ashwin’s coaches. They were tough, ruthless even. In a modern culture when coaches are combinations of friends, companions, sounding boards, enablers, constantly careful not to compromise a player’s individuality, it is fascinating to read of this quite different pedagogy at work.

At the same time, it never curbed Ashwin’s own propensity for experimentation and imitation: ‘Sometimes I copy Harbhajan Singh’s bowling action, whom I consider a hero after he single-handed beat Australia in 2000-1, sometimes Romesh Powar. Sometimes I bowl off spin; on the odd occasion I bowl legs-in with the same action, but I invariably get wickets.’ Ashwin maintained this characteristic throughout his career. He was restlessly tireless, tirelessly restless, immersed in his own game, but also in everyone else’s. Rahul Dravid has a pleasing glimpse of him in his introduction.

“I have seen Paras Mhambrey, our bowling coach, occasionally try to impress something upon him. Ash will verbally duel with him, and it never appears that Paras has been able to fully convince him. And yet, two days later, we will see Ash trying the same thing in the nets all my himself. Then we just look at each other, smile and nod: look, he is actually trying to find out why you asked him to do a certain thing.”

Why the departure?

So why now? Why would a player so steeped in the game step down from its international pedestal? I suspect it was not the playing that finally stretched Ashwin thin, but the not playing — the sense of not being guaranteed a place overseas because of India’s dual objectives of lengthening its batting and packing an extra seamer.

Since the last Border-Gavaskar Trophy here four years ago, he had played only nine away Tests, and was unlikely to form part of India’s first-choice XI in England next year. Sunil Gavaskar thinks Ashwin lacks the mental wherewithal to go on in these circumstances, while admitting that it is ‘a bit surprising’.

Still, I’m not sure we should underestimate the toll of fifteen years at the very top of the very top of cricket — membership of the Indian cricket team. In The Tao of Cricket, Ashis Nandy reflected on the extraordinary burden of cricketers in his country — ‘how eleven players with an average age less than thirty and mostly innocent of politics and culture’ must ‘recover the self-esteem of all India.’ It’s a tribute to Ashwin that he made it look like this is what he was born for.

(with permission from Cricket Et Al)

Watch: R. Ashwin’s career highlights

One of India’s greatest offspinners, R. Ashwin announced his retirement from international cricket midway through the Test series in Australia on December 18th, 2024, in Brisbane.

Here’s a look at his career in numbers.

India’s Ravichandran Ashwin.
| Photo Credit: AP

R. Ashwin hailed India’s current bowling riches and hoped that the legacy of the current generation would inspire the next set of bowlers to take it forward.

“Each of those bowlers that bowl alongside me has the ability to hold on to a game, bowl with discipline and yet produce wicket-taking balls,” said Ashwin, who clinched a record-equalling 11th Player-of-the-Series award for his all-round effort.

Belief

“It is not just their ability alone. It is also the belief of the entire team. When Rohit says that you make 400 to try and make a game out of it, it tells you that the captain believes the bowlers will get the job done. These bowlers have done it day in and day out. And they have the ability to pick 20 wickets. The bowling attack is quite special, and I hope that this legacy of bowling is taken forward,” he added.

Explaining how India fashioned this remarkable win in under two days, Ashwin revealed that the aim was to have at least 70 to 80 overs to bowl out Bangladesh again.

“When we gathered inside, he mentioned that we would go hammer and tongs and try to make 400 runs in probably 50 overs. In that bargain, if we got bowled out of less than 200, it was okay because we made a game of it. Saying that is one, and when he said that, we knew how Yashasvi would play. But Rohit walked out and tonked the first ball for a six.”

“When you walk the talk, I think the dressing room has no choice but to follow that pattern. We had 50 runs in three overs, and there was no looking,” Ashwin remarked.

When asked about breaking Muttiah Muralitharan’s record for most Player of the Series awards, the 38-year-old insisted that cherishing memories is more important than records.

“I do not have an answer for that. But I would like to do it at a special occasion,” said Ashwin. “Probably if I end up with that, it’s great. But these are not things that motivate me any more, honestly. For me, the love of the game is something that I have harped upon repeatedly. It makes a world of difference for me to enjoy what I do. I am so glad I have gotten here. I would like to retain that happiness.”

Ravichandran Ashwin
| Photo Credit: PTI

 At 38, R. Ashwin is probably in the final phase of his career.

And with India set to host only four Tests next year (two each against South Africa and West Indies), it remains to be seen whether Chennai will get another Test soon if the usual rotation policy for venues applies.

In case Ashwin doesn’t get to add to his tally of five Tests here, the wily off-spinner can peacefully ride into the sunset knowing he scored a century, took a six-wicket haul and was the Player-of-the-Match in his final outing at the M.A. Chidambaram Stadium.

When asked if the game against Bangladesh that ended on Sunday could be his last one in his home town, Ashwin pondered and then explained how hard it is to predict the next Test match or the series. At the same time, he also seemed at peace if it turned out to be his final bow at Chepauk.

“Yeah, quite a good question. I don’t know. What is swansong? Every time you walk out to the park, it is a swansong. You are talking about a Test match. Maybe or maybe not. Who knows,” remarked Ashwin, who clinched his 10th Player-of-the-Match award.

“Every day, every Test match I play is a big thing. Not only for me, for cricketers to go through a Test match or a series is a grind. You never know what is next regarding Tests. Because you put in that effort and must be lucky enough to get those performances, work hard, and manage your ups and downs simultaneously.”

“These are all huge challenges for any Test cricketer. So, I haven’t thought so far ahead, but if that was my swansong (in Chennai), what a swansong,” he added.

In what has already been an eventful year in terms of records, Ashwin went past Courtney Walsh’s tally of 519 scalps and is now eighth on the all-time list with 522 wickets. On how he keeps reinventing himself, Ashwin conceded it was getting challenging.

“It’s not the same as when you are 25, 30 or even 35. 38 is different to 35. Every bit of work that you put in, you have to put it doubly hard to earn the right to be there. There are challenges for me to go through. Usually, it takes a little bit longer. I just wanted to enjoy my game and be the best that I can be. I am not ambitious and want to play as long as I can,” Ashwin elaborated.

The Tamil Nadu player also said he did not want to think too far into the future, ahead of a long season with nine more Tests scheduled.

“When you look so far ahead, it can be quite deflating. You have to stack it up. There are good breaks between games. More than skill, I think it is about physically being able to go through the season, which is of utmost importance to me right now,” said Ashwin.

 Pacer Hasan Mahmud emerged the most successful Bangladesh bowler, snaring five wickets for 83 runs.
| Photo Credit: R. Ragu

Riding on Ravichandran Ashwin’s century and his 199-run partnership with Ravindra Jadeja, India were all out for a competitive 376 on the second day of the opening Test against Bangladesh here on Friday.

India, who started the day at 339/6, lost all four wickets for the addition of just 37 runs with Jadeja (86) being the first to fall.

Ashwin added 11 more runs to his overnight score of 102 before he was dismissed by Taskin Ahmed for 113.

The Bangladesh pacer grabbed three wickets (3/55) — Jadeja, Ashwin and Akash Deep.

Pacer Hasan Mahmud emerged the most successful Bangladesh bowler, snaring five wickets for 83 runs.

Scoreboard: Day 2

India 1st Innings (Overnight 339/6; 80 overs): Yashasvi Jaiswal c Islam b Rana 56 Rohit Sharma c Shanto b Mahmud 6 Shubman Gill c Das b Mahmud 0 Virat Kohli c Das b Mahmud 6 Rishabh Pant c Das b Mahmud 39 KL Rahul c Hasan b Mehidy 16 Ravindra Jadeja c Das b Taskin 86 Ravichandran Ashwin c Shanto b Taskin 113 Akash Deep c Shanto b Taskin 17 Jasprit Bumrah c Hasan b Mahmud 7 Mohammed Siraj not out 0 Extras (B-18, LB-7, NB-4, W-1) 30 Total (all out in 91.2 overs) 376 Fall of Wickets: 1-14, 2-28, 3-34, 4-96, 5-144, 6-144, 7-343, 8-367, 9-374.

Bangladesh Bowling: Taskin Ahmed 21-4-55-3, Hasan Mahmud 22.2-4-83-5, Nahid Rana 18-2-82-1, Mehidy Hasan Miraz 21-2-77-1, Shakib Al Hasan 8-0-50-0, Mominul Haque 1-0-4-0.