← Empire: World History
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- [00:01]
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If you want access to bonus episodes reading lists for every series of Empire, a chat community, discounts for all the books mentioned in the week's podcast ad, free listening and a weekly newsletter, sign up to empire club@www.empirepoduk.com. this episode is brought to you by the American Revolution on pbs. It began with voices carried on the wind, arguments in taverns, whispers at kitchen tables, the tramp of boots on muddy fields. From sparks kindled in America grew an upheaval that shook an empire, gave birth to a nation, and altered the course of history. Ken Burns landmark PBS series the American Revolution casts the familiar in a new light, illuminating stories left in shadow. The American Revolution is more than history. It's an exploration of the United States at its founding, its people, values, families and its place in the world. The choices of past and present are woven into the same fabric. As the United states nears its 250th year, these stories remind us that the revolution is not history pressed between pages, but a force still shaping the world today. The American Revolution premieres on Sunday, November 16th on PBS and the PBS app.
- [01:30]
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- [02:39]
William Dalrymple
Hello and welcome to Empire with me.
- [02:42]
Anita Anand
Anita Anand and me, William Dalrymple.
- [02:45]
William Dalrymple
Now this is our second in our little mini series about Empire and cricket, and we've been looking at the way in which imperial politics sort of weaves in and out of the world of international test cricket. We had an absolute corker last time talking about the Ashes, which is in full swing at the moment. But now we're going to be talking about pre partition India. So when we talk about India, we know, we know, we know that Pakistan and Bangladesh are test playing nations. But when we talk about this, we're going to talk in the context of India for this. And once again, we are in the company of the brilliant Tim Wigmore who has a. Well, show us the book. It's a lovely book. History of test cricket. It's called Test Cricket, so it does what it says on the tin and it's. I mean, it's a brilliant, brilliant read. Wonderful read. And it's also augmented so well with your entire encyclopedia of knowledge. So thanks very much for being with us. What we're here to talk about is India and cricket. And if you want to gauge the passion that the subcontinent has for cricket, you need look no further than Bollywood's treatment of this period of history when India takes on England. It's a film called Lagan, a film called Lacan.
- [03:53]
Anita Anand
It is the legend, the blockbuster called Lagan. You've been living in London too long.
- [03:59]
William Dalrymple
Listen, even in London, this was an absolute fever pitch moment. So Lagan, for those of you who may not have seen it, it's set in 1893 during the height of British colonial rule and it's a little village called Champanare in central India. The villagers are struggling under the heavy taxation, land tax burden of Ligan and they are being ground down by the British authorities. There's a particularly sadistic captain called Andrew Russell and he keeps putting up the taxes and the villagers keep begging him, stop doing this, you know, you're killing us. And the leader of the villages is Hooven, played by the marvellous Aamir Khan, who is absolute Bollywood royalty. Let me tell you, anyone who watches Indian films will know that Aamir Khan is right at, you know, the Mount Olympus of actors. And we're getting him on the podcast. Can you believe it? We're getting him on the podcast only for our club members. So if you want to listen to that exclusively on our club, it's empirepoduk.com that's empirepoduk.com. just click into that and you will get to see Aamir Khan. You'll get our newsletter, you'll get quick access and early access to miniseries. You know, if you loved him, who doesn't? You get to hear all of his three episodes in one go. Aamir Khan's Bouven challenges the British to a cricket match which they don't know how to play, by the way. The villagers have no idea how to play it and says, you know, if we beat you, you're going to cancel the taxation for three Years. But the British say, if you lose, you have to pay us three times as much. Now, this was an absolutely bonkers moment in cinema. Where did you watch it, William? I guess you watched it in India, didn't you?
- [05:34]
Anita Anand
I actually watched it near Piccadilly Circus.
- [05:36]
William Dalrymple
Bizarrely unexpected answer.
- [05:38]
Anita Anand
Oh, there was a cinema that had it on for about seven years after it had sort of come out and played nothing other than the Mousetrap.
- [05:45]
William Dalrymple
I watched it in Hounslow with a completely Asian audience and the popcorn throwing. Honestly, every time a six was scored, it was like it was being scored in a match taking place in front of you. And people would stand up and go chunky, which is what people say in the crowds. For a six. Tim, did you watch it? I mean, was it a similar experience for you?
- [06:05]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah, watched it with a few friends and a curry, appropriately enough. And it was obviously very, very long in the best Friday traditions, but completely worth the length.
- [06:14]
Anita Anand
It's four hours. Four hours, but gripping every minute.
- [06:17]
William Dalrymple
And there's nothing wrong with that. Nothing wrong with it at all.
- [06:20]
Tim Wigmore
It was a compliment.
- [06:21]
William Dalrymple
Let's talk about the origin story, then, of Indian cricket. I guess you have to take us all the way back to the 1700s. It was sort of more a beach game in the 1700s, wasn't it? And it's the first game thought to have been played in Gujarat. Am I right in saying that?
- [06:36]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah. So the first game that we know about was played by British merchant sailors along the beachfront in Cambay.
- [06:43]
William Dalrymple
What do we know about this Cambay match? Because it's a port area and it's near Ahmedabad. I mean, that's such a strategic location.
- [06:49]
Tim Wigmore
A British sailor talks about. So basically, the boat was lying for a fortnight in a channel there. He writes in his diary, why we every day diverse ourselves with playing cricket. So that was, as far as we know, the first cricket played in India. And actually in 1792 in Calcutta, the Calcutta Cricket Club is formed. And this is the oldest cricket club in the world outside England. So even older than any in Australia, which was on that previous episode. The history is remarkably long before we talked about cricket as a kind of window into empire and how things work. And I think the first formal cricket match shows that really well. So this is played in Calcutta again in 1804, and the two teams are Old Etonian civil servants versus other civil servants.
- [07:30]
William Dalrymple
Okay, so the toffs and the not so common but commoner team playing against each other. There's a fabulous image from 1859 from the Calcutta Cricket Club. It could be an Oxford or Cambridge picture of, you know, sort of people sort of lounging by a people tree. It looks like all mustachioed and pith, helmeted in the best clothes. It looks like this was a game for Europeans. I mean, it wasn't anything involving the locals at all in any way, was it?
- [07:57]
Tim Wigmore
So that was initially the case. And the first Indian community that get on board with cricket is the Parsi.
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Anita Anand
Community, who are the most anglicised and Anglophile of all the Indian communities and.
- [08:07]
Tim Wigmore
Very much concentrated in coastal areas.
- [08:10]
Anita Anand
Yeah, between Gujarat and Bombay. Exactly.
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Tim Wigmore
So the Parsi has become hugely important in the development of Indian cricket. And the first Parsi club is formed in Mumbai in 1848. And this is again thought to be the first club for Indian people in India. And actually what happens in 1877? The Parsis challenge, the Bombay Gymkhana, which is the premier British only club, to a match. And this becomes a regular affair where the Parsis will play the British. It represents the start of Europeans playing Indians in cricket.
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William Dalrymple
The Parsis club was called the Oriental Cricket Club. Were they any good?
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Tim Wigmore
They are good. And so obviously the Bombay Gymkhana, they assume we'll just pulverize them, win easily. In fact, you know, the first game is a draw and the games become really evenly contested. And this game is played regularly until 1906. The parties win 11 and the Europeans only 10. So in fact, the parties are more than holding their own. This leads to really the formative early competition in Indian cricket, which is trying the tournament initially, but it expands and expands. So this is played in Bombay between different communities. The first two teams are Europeans and the Parsis. And then from 1907 you have a Hindu team invited, then from 1912 you have a Muslim team invited. And then eventually in 1937 you have the rest, which includes Sikhs and Indian Christians.
- [09:27]
William Dalrymple
Let's just sort of hang back with the Parsis just a little while longer because, as Willi said, you know, sort of the most Westernized of all Indians. And they did business, they went to school and learned English, they understood about.
- [09:40]
Anita Anand
English manners, the community that produced Freddie Mercury, among others.
- [09:44]
William Dalrymple
Indeed, when they arrive in England in 1877 and they open their first matches at Sheffield park and then they have a game at Lords, the home of the Marylebone Cricket Club, the mcc, the Parsis are almost reverential about even being there. So there's a dinner. I love this story. There's a dinner on the eve of their departure and Sir Feroz Shah Mehta, who is a Noted political leader and is part of this Parsi contingent that is playing cricket in England. He says, I'll read the quote. As artists go to Italy to do homage to great masters, as pilgrims go to Jerusalem to worship at a shrine. So now the Parsis are going to England to do homage to the English cricketers, to learn something at that noble and manly pastime in the very country which is its chosen home.
- [10:29]
Anita Anand
Such a puzzy quote. That is brilliant.
- [10:32]
William Dalrymple
But the British press liked them. They said these were the best of all Indians, didn't they? I mean, there was a lot of positive feedback that came back with these Parsi tours.
- [10:40]
Tim Wigmore
Absolutely. There's not a sense of communities being in opposition to each other. It's very much a sense of being united through cricket. For most people in England, it's the first experience they would have ever had of Indian people, those Parsi tours.
- [10:53]
Anita Anand
But how interesting that the rest of Indian cricket is on communal lines. Is there anywhere else in the world where games are played only between religious communities? It's a weird thing. You don't get sort of Christian football matches and Muslim teams and Hindu teams. But are you doing the cricket at this period?
- [11:09]
Tim Wigmore
That's right. The amazing amount, these tournaments and they're actually mirrored, you get some in Karachi as well, but Bombay very much remains the premier place. You get cricketers who travel from all around the subcontinent to go and play in these matches and they're incredibly well supported and prestigious and the lack of kind of communalism is really striking. So there's a famous game in 1944 and the Muslims beat the Hindus in a very close final in Mumbai. It said that everybody, including, you know, all the Hindu crowds, they're all cheering the Muslims at the end. People attach a huge important to these matches. So with Jinnah and Gandhi, they are very aware of these matches and they attach their own importance to them. So with Jinnah, he's very happy about relations. He sees in these communal matches pentangular as it is by then, because it's got five teams by then.
- [11:52]
William Dalrymple
So it's called the pentangular game. Just to. Just to stress that. Is that right?
- [11:55]
Tim Wigmore
It develops as you get more teams. It becomes a triangular, then a quadrangular, then a pentangular. When you get the rest, who include the seats and the Christians from 1937.
- [12:04]
William Dalrymple
One thing that strikes me though, is that again, sort of the othering of the Parsees that goes on, you know, they're not real Indians. They're not really like the rest. There's a quote in one cricket publication that talks about the Parsis, saying the Parsi fraternity is the most intelligent as well as the most loyal of the races scattered over our possessions, it says. So there still is very much sort of like a respect for the Parsi teams, but the rest are still regarded as somewhat, you know, less than.
- [12:31]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah, that's right. And we see. So the first or India tool, as opposed to distinctly parsley tours England is in 1911, and that is dominated by Parsis. You have seven Parsis, five Hindus and three Muslims. But within that, there is an amazing diversity of players in the team. So Pawanka Balu is the star player and he is a Dalit.
- [12:52]
Anita Anand
Those are the former Untouchables.
- [12:55]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah, he's an incredible player and he's the absolute star of the tour. It sort of is accessible to players from a wide range, but really the vast majority are. Are from the more privileged groups, for sure.
- [13:07]
William Dalrymple
Well, I want to talk about Baloo more in a second, but I also want to talk about Gandhi, because you mentioned Nehru and Jinnah being great fans of, you know, when the pentangular happened and talking about no communal tensions. But Gandhi was opposed to them from the very beginning because he thought actually dividing these cricket teams along communal lines or according to their religion was just harmful and it was another way of dividing up the country. And Baloo was a really interesting character because although, you know, he, as you say, was born of the untouchable Jamar caste, as it was then known. You know, his father was a sepoy in the 112th Infantry Regiment of the British Indian Army. And I love the story about how his life was transformed and how cricket came into his life, because this wasn't a time cricket's still sort of quite young. People might play it, but not the way they do. If you go to India now, where every street or every gully, you'll see some really quite, you know, tasty bowling and batting going on amongst young people at a scale that I've seen very little in other countries. Everybody plays it, but there is a man called JG Greg who comes into Baloo's life now. Do you know much about JG Greg? Because he's the one who sort of notices that Baloo isn't just one of these kids who's just playing for fun, but he's playing with real talent. Tell us a bit about that relationship.
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Tim Wigmore
Yeah, so he begins as a kind of bowler in the nets, and he notices that this guy has an amazing amount of talent. He sponsors him because he's A groundsman in a club in Pune.
- [14:39]
William Dalrymple
Baloo is. He's looking after the Parsee grounds. That's right. He's sort of cleaning up right then.
- [14:43]
Tim Wigmore
Out of that, Greg supports him and actually helps to get him to play and not just be a net bowler.
- [14:49]
William Dalrymple
Isn't there an even more cute story where, you know, he sees Baloo playing in the nets and he thinks that is pretty good, and he says, you know what? I'll give you eight anas every time you can dismiss me in the nets. If you can get the better of me, I'll give you eight ANAs. And that's where he sort of starts him on almost sort of an unofficial training regime in the nets that, you know, eight annas will mean a lot to someone like Baloo. And so then he sees that he's very, very talented and decides then to take him on.
- [15:20]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah. So then everyone actually starts to take him seriously. So in 1896, when he would have been 20, he moves to Bombay and plays for the Hindu Gymkhana Club. And then he gets insisted in Bombay. Bombay is basically where you go to make your fortune as a cricketer, as.
- [15:36]
Anita Anand
Happens today, you know, in a whole variety of ways. Still, it's the setting for Slumdog Millionaire. All these kids arriving in the big city and finding their way. But poor El Balu is not treated well, despite being the star of the team. He's made to eat apart and drink apart and be apart, isn't he?
- [15:53]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah, because as a Dalit, he suffers all those prejudices. And his cricket ability is relevant when he's on the pitch, but not off it. And actually, even on the pitch, being Dalit is still very relevant. So for this tour to injure in 1911, based on cricketing merit, he should have been the captain. But of course, he's not picked as the captain because he's not the sort of person that India wants to be captain. And we talked about how England on the previous episode, they want the right sort of person, as they see it, to be captain. The same is true of India as well. And so instead, India pick their captain is a prince who travels with five servants. So that is the range of the Indian team then in 1911.
- [16:31]
William Dalrymple
I mean, is the prince with the servants any good at cricket or is he, you know, like you were talking about with the England team sometimes, where the cricketer didn't even deserve a place on the team? Is that the same case with the Indian team?
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Tim Wigmore
Yeah, he's not great at cricket. But India do later pick some much worse People to be captain, which we can talk about later if we like.
- [16:49]
Anita Anand
Got a picture of Balou. And he's quite a dressy character. He's not like, he's sort of some sort of cowering figure. Well, he looks like a movie star.
- [16:55]
Tim Wigmore
And his cricket ability is the catalyst for his amazing kind of post playing career. He becomes, you know, prominent in politics as a campaigner for Dalit writes. So cricket actually gives him a visibility which he then uses for other purposes. And in a way, if he hadn't been good at cricket, he wouldn't have had his political career at all.
- [17:12]
William Dalrymple
Yeah, I mean, just, just a little in a nutshell and we can maybe do this in, in greater detail in a future podcast. He's first of all very, very good friends with Babasal Bambedkar, who is sort of the leader of Dalit rites in India. And they are very close. And you know, Ambedkar sees a great poster boy in Pavanka Balu and thinks, you know, this is going to be the thing that changes everything, that this is the best man on the side. Even when the side does tragically badly, as it did in 1911, he's the one who shines out. They go along together, but then they fall out with each other and it's a dramatic falling out which is only kind of resolved during the funeral of one. But tell us about another name. When you talk about Indian cricket, you cannot not talk about Ranji Singh. And Ranji Singh, I mean, there's a trophy in his name. If you look at pictures. Just Google him. This is like every inch a royal, an Indian royal in, you know, the pearl bedecked headdress, emblazoned silk turban and costume. You know, he looks royal.
- [18:13]
Anita Anand
He is royal and he's another Trinity man. He also went to Trinity College, Cambridge.
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Podcast Advertiser
Important.
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Tim Wigmore
He is Ranji. He is the son of a village farmer, but he's adopted as an heir by the Jam Seb of an Indian statelet. So he's, he's kind of not official royalty, but effectively he is royalty.
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William Dalrymple
And Jam sahib, Willi, I mean, how would you define a Jam Sahib? It's like a noble or a sort of a noble in the, in the kingdom, isn't it? Exactly, not exactly the, the prince or the, the maharaja, but somebody who's right up there is a jam sub.
- [18:43]
Anita Anand
It's still pretty, it's still pretty posh.
- [18:44]
William Dalrymple
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. So, okay, so the jamsab adopts him. So he' you know, sort of a better lineage and Then what happens to him?
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Tim Wigmore
Well, he moves to England. He goes to Trinity College in Cambridge to study and there he plays cricket obsessively. And he is seen as this very kind of mythical figure, I think, you know, from the East. He's seen as this gives him some exoticism. He adds to this through the way he plays. So he's a revolutionary. He kind of invents all these. Popularizes the leg glance, which is basically a flicker, a flick. You play to the leg side and it's a very elegant shot.
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Anita Anand
What does that mean for us non cricketers?
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Tim Wigmore
Normally if the ball was outside your off stump, you'd hit it to the offside in the direction of the ball and he's hitting it in the other direction. So he basically kind of reimagines the geometry of the field. He opens up these new corners, the way he plays.
- [19:38]
Anita Anand
Do you want to translate that for me?
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William Dalrymple
Well, yes, he flicks it in a way you wouldn't expect, Willy. That's all you need to know.
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Anita Anand
Okay, got that.
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William Dalrymple
Flicks it in a very beautiful, elegant way where you wouldn't expect it to go. But that's his reinvention. Elegance. And people talk about the elegance of his play. I think it's. The Guardian journalist Neville Cardis calls him the midsummer night's dream of cricket. Now, I'm not even sure I know what that means, but I think it's a good thing. I think it's a compliment. Right.
- [20:03]
Anita Anand
Sort of like Tatiana and Oberon, you know, the Royals in this kind of dreamy world.
- [20:08]
Tim Wigmore
He's pit for England in 1896. He makes his debut and he does very, very well for England in the Ashes and stuff. So he is. Matt Nitenji is maybe the best player, the best batsman in the whole world, but he basically has to end up retiring early to become the Maharaj as a full time gig. But he gives his name to the Ranji Trophy which is launched indeed in 1934 and is actually the first kind of major non communal competition in India, even though the Pentangla still seems more prestigious.
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William Dalrymple
You said he was picked for the side. We should give a date to that. That's 1896 and he plays at Old Trafford. He hadn't been picked to play at Lords. Is there politics involved in that? That you know you can't have a Brown fella playing at Lords? Or am I just imagining that?
- [20:54]
Tim Wigmore
No, that's absolutely right. I mean there's politics throughout his career. So he's. Yeah, there's. The home ground has a say in who is picked. And the people at Lords, they do not seem to want Ranji to be picked. And actually, you get this reoccurring figure which you'll know a lot about. Lord Harris.
- [21:10]
William Dalrymple
Oh, tell us about Lord Harris. Now, that's a good character to discuss. Tell us all about Lord Harris. Who's he?
- [21:14]
Tim Wigmore
So, Lord Harris. Yeah, he's born in Trinidad. He's the fourth Baron Harris. He goes on to play Test cricket for England in the Ashes as an amateur. Of course, his father is governor of Trinidad. He goes to Eton himself. He then, you know, becomes this sort of incredibly senior figure in the running of English. English cricket, including selection. And despite being born in Trinidad himself, he oppose what he calls are birds of a different feather to play for England. He then, of course, becomes God of Bombay. And he makes a famous prediction in 1921, just talking about the prospects for Indian cricket. And he's very dismissive. And he says, notwithstanding their multitudes, I doubt if they're going to turn out a team of all India as good. The best of our county clubs.
- [22:09]
Anita Anand
So there are tours of South Africa, aren't there? And South Africa, even at this stage, pre apartheid, is famously racially divided.
- [22:16]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah. And the basis, the South African board, they basically put pressure on England not to select Ranji. So even though on merit, Ranji should easily be in the team, he's not selected to tour. It's 98 or 1902 to South Africa. South Africa make it clear by, you know, unofficial channels that they only want to play against white players. And England adhered to that. England, they're very close English with Africa at this time. And they. Yeah, they basically adhered to that.
- [22:40]
Anita Anand
This is the same period that Mahatma Gandhi is being thrown off his train at Mariksburg and this sort of thing, isn't it? Things are very tense at that time.
- [22:48]
Tim Wigmore
Absolutely. And so Ranji is. Yeah, he's just. He's not selected. So he plays 15 times for England as an average of 45, which is really exceptional for that era. But he would have played a lot more but for the racial politics and I suppose for his own princely duties as well. Also a factor in that when you.
- [23:03]
William Dalrymple
Have India playing England, politics is going to creep into this, isn't it? And I just wonder when the nationalist movement starts to gain momentum. So we're talking, particularly in the 1930s, where a lot of. Of nationalist leaders are being pulled in and put in prison, how does that impact cricket and the way people are attending matches or being selected for matches or indeed turning up to watch matches.
- [23:27]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah. So, of course, the first big question, will India be allowed to become a Test nation and gain Test status? Is before you have England, Australia, South Africa, all white nations, but in fact, 1928, India do become a Test nation. Their first tour, their first series is planned for 1930-31 against. Against England. But in fact, the tour is cancelled because of the civil, civil disobedience campaign in India. So politics again is encroaching from the very start. And then India, they do Tour England in 1932, which is their. Will be their first ever series of Test matches. But three of their players withdraw from the tour in protest at the imprisonment of Gandhi. At the time, several Indian players are very. I think they're very conscious that to be sharing a pitch with England in a way could be to kind of give tacit consent to British rule. So this dynamic really, it plays out right from the start of Indian test cricket.
- [24:22]
William Dalrymple
This sort of, you know, the fact that so many are withdrawing and not cooperating with cricket because they see it as a political statement, leads to the era. Shall we call it the era? The Nepo baby.
- [24:32]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah, I think it's a Nepo baby era. We can call it that.
- [24:35]
William Dalrymple
I mean, describe why it's the era of the Nepo babies. It's cringe. But who gets to play instead?
- [24:40]
Tim Wigmore
So we talked about, with England, the sort of social kudos that's attached to the captaincy. Well, that is even more so the case in India. So it's almost like you have a conversation about who you pick in your squad and then you have a separate parallel conversation about who should be captain. That's not even related to cricket ability at all. So the first tour during the 1932. And then you're obsessed with the question of who will be captain. And so you have. The Maharaj of Patiala is initially. He's initially appointed as captain, basically because he offers to underwrite and pay for the whole tour and organise all these trials. He pulls out because of ill health.
- [25:13]
William Dalrymple
Well, he was quite a fat man. I mean, this is a bit of.
- [25:17]
Tim Wigmore
A theme as well at this time, of captains. Yeah. Then you have the Maharaj Kumar of Vizram, who had donated 50,000 rupees for the tour. He had pulled out before already, which leaves, you know, a kind of vacancy for a third candidate. And this is the. The Maharaja Paul Panda, who is very enthusiastic at cricket, as we all are. He's also very bad at playing cricket.
- [25:39]
William Dalrymple
As most of us are, as most.
- [25:40]
Tim Wigmore
Of us are, as well. So he plays four matches on this. This is the most incredible kind of fact that is actually true. It sounds made up, but he plays four matches on this tour and he scores only two runs in these four matches. But he buys three Rolls Royces on this tour. And so therefore, it's famously said, he leaves with more Rolls Royces than he does runs. So he is, as a kind of embodiment of the kind of amateur captain he is perfect. The only thing in his credit is he has a little bit of self awareness. And by that I mean he is the kind of ceremonial captain. He is the guy at all the cocktail parties and he plays against the county teams, but he doesn't play in the actual test matches because he recognises that he is so inept that he shouldn't.
- [26:25]
William Dalrymple
Bit rubbish.
- [26:26]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah, but he has those Rolls Royces. He could probably drive them during the test matches rather than play.
- [26:30]
Anita Anand
I think he'll drive his own Rolls Royce.
- [26:32]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah, that's true. He won't be.
- [26:34]
William Dalrymple
Yeah.
- [26:34]
Tim Wigmore
And then in 36, England's ear, India's next source. At England, they again have the same question and this time they go for Maharaj Kumar Vizram, who had been in the running in 32. He brings two servants and 36 items of personal luggage to England. And this time, unlike Paul Banner, he does insist on actually playing. So he. So basically in cricket, your specialist bats from bat in the top six positions and your ball is about below that. But vis in Agram, because he can't bowl and he can't really bat, so he becomes a specialist number nine, which is a new position really. It's kind of. You might get that as the last player who you pick in a village team. And he averages eight, which is pretty appalling. And he plays all three matches. So you have this kind of perverse situation where India are quite a weak team anyway, and then they are weakening themselves by being nowhere near at full strength, by picking these people who are completely ill suited to be the captain.
- [27:26]
William Dalrymple
It doesn't sort of shore up the image of these birds of a different feather being able to cricket. It sort of proves Lord Harris right in. In many ways. So that is the embarrassing golden age of cricket when, you know, gold mattered. We're going to take a break here. Join us after the break when we come back with one of the most seismic episodes in politics in the Indian subcontinent and we talk about how that affected cricket. Join us.
- [27:58]
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William Dalrymple
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- [30:16]
Anita Anand
Welcome back. So we're now in 1947 and India is about to be split in two and Britain is about to divide and quit. How does this affect cricket, Tim? And how does it affect cricketers, particularly Fazl Mahmood and Kothari Naioudu?
- [30:33]
Tim Wigmore
So the Faisal Mahmood story is really, yeah, incredible. So he's a Muslim fastballer from Lahore. Context is there's an India tour of Australia coming up in that winter. India haven't toured Australia before and it's a huge, huge deal for them and he's desperate to be on that tour and he's so sort of single mindedly focused on this. He's oblivious to the politics that's actually happening. At the same time, there's basically a touring camp is planned for Pune on 15th of August. Of course this is the same date.
- [31:00]
William Dalrymple
As partition, but people don't know, that's the thing, because people don't know about the date. So we've talked about this with partition before, you know that people did not know which side they would be on. They knew partition was coming, they didn't know the date it would be happening. They didn't know which side they would be on.
- [31:14]
Tim Wigmore
They didn't know the full boundaries yet.
- [31:15]
William Dalrymple
They knew nothing of these things. So of course, if in the cricketing calendar they've got this camp, training camp that's scheduled, nobody knows that that's actually going to be one of the bloodiest days in history. That's what's planned. It's going to be Tim and all India side because, you know, why not?
- [31:33]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah. And we should actually say India in the 30s, they have, you know, they have Muslim players. It's a team that's picked on merit. Really.
- [31:40]
William Dalrymple
Yeah. Absolutely non segregated. So Hindu, Sikhs and Muslims all in one team. So this is a team 16 member cricket squad that selected months in advance.
- [31:49]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah. Which was the norm because you have to plan your arrangements and everything. So Fazel on 14th of August, you.
- [31:55]
Anita Anand
Know, 1947, while millions are passing through the border, bullock carts are rumbling.
- [32:00]
Tim Wigmore
Muslims going the other direction to Lahore. But he undertakes this incredible thousand mile journey where he basically he goes through Punjab, Karachi, then he flies to Bombay and then he gets a train to Pune. He's going kind of against the grain into history.
- [32:15]
Anita Anand
And is he somebody who is an instantly familiar figure like an Indian cricket. Is he someone who will arrive at the station and the whole station will stop the massacre and go and get his autograph or not?
- [32:28]
Tim Wigmore
He's not at this point. No, he's not thinking everyone would know. And people can tell he's Muslim.
- [32:34]
William Dalrymple
I mean they can tell if he says his name. But what you have at this point in time is that you have people being stopped appallingly on trains and being asked what their name is and sometimes being asked to prove that they haven't been circumcised or they have been circumcised to prove what nationality they are or.
- [32:49]
Anita Anand
What faith they are rather.
- [32:50]
William Dalrymple
And he's caught up in that. Violent thugs who are out for blood set upon him when they believe that he's a Muslim. Just a bit of background on that. And then who steps in to save him? Tim. Because it's gorgeous.
- [33:04]
Tim Wigmore
So we should say he gets to this. He gets to this training camp and there's a monsoon and so he's not even. There's not. The practice is cancelled, kind of regardless of the political situation. But actually it's on the way back that he almost stopped. Dies. He's getting the train, but he's from Pune to Bombay, but he gets to train with Katari Naiadu, you know, the Indian cricket and a Hindu. And Faisal, people find out he's Muslims and he's being attacked. And Nyardu literally defends and keeps Faisal alive with his cricket bat.
- [33:36]
William Dalrymple
He just swings at them with a bat. I mean, it's amazing.
- [33:40]
Tim Wigmore
And obviously cricket bat, you can do a lot of damage, but yeah, it's incredible.
- [33:42]
Anita Anand
Is there a movie about this?
- [33:44]
Tim Wigmore
No, but there should be.
- [33:45]
William Dalrymple
It's such a gorgeous story.
- [33:46]
Anita Anand
There's another moment when a station master gives him a Sikh symbol, the Kadda, to try and show that he's a Sikh, because he's obviously North Indian. If he's in Pune, people can tell by how tall he is and how fair he is that he's North Indian, but they don't know whether he's Punjabi, Sikh or Hindu. So he's given this Sikh symbol and the two things between Qatari and Aidu and the Sikh symbol. He survives.
- [34:09]
William Dalrymple
He survives that he's safe. After Partition, you know what will happen is that you will have people who play cricket on the same side, who were teammates, who, you know, battled together shoulder to shoulder, who will find themselves on opposing teams. And there's also going to be a lot of speculation about which team will be stronger as a result of this. There was a lot of stuff said about diet and who could do what because of what they ate after Partition. Just talk us through a little bit of that because I find that fascinating.
- [34:36]
Tim Wigmore
So in the 1930s, when India are starting out in test cricket, they have some very good fast bowlers. Bowlers, They're Muslim fast bowlers from very soon after Partition. So the first 1952 Vijay Merchant, one of India's funnest players, but a batsman, he says, you know, the, the tragedy of Partition is it's to deprive India of their fast bowling stocks. He says India often relied for fast bowling on the north Indian people, who, because of their height and physique, are better equipped for this kind of bowling than the cricketers of central or south India. Now the supply, the source of supply has ceased. So it becomes almost a self perpetuating Thing that India without access to people who are now in Pakistan they can't get the fast bowlers.
- [35:19]
William Dalrymple
I heard they went even further than that that you can't expect a fast bowler to come from India because they're all vegetarian and it's the meat eaters who have the strength and the speed. I mean is that the kind of guff that was flying around at the time?
- [35:31]
Tim Wigmore
Absolutely. It becomes self actuating and that that India kind of stops trying to produce fast bowlers and then adopts this strategy of having lots of spin bowls which becomes the character of Indian cricket. But this was actually it was always there in cricket but it wasn't as much a part of it before partition as as afterwards.
- [35:49]
Anita Anand
Explain to me why someone could be a spin bowler but not a fast bowler because they vegetarian or meat eater.
- [35:54]
Podcast Advertiser
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- [35:55]
William Dalrymple
Well, it's about strength. It's about strength and muscle, isn't it Tim? I mean that's what it comes down to.
- [36:00]
Tim Wigmore
Say you're a top cricketer. People would probably assume you're a spin bowler rather than a fastballer.
- [36:04]
Anita Anand
Is that am I meant to take.
- [36:07]
Tim Wigmore
Spinballs are the great. The thinkers.
- [36:10]
William Dalrymple
The understanding that I have growing up with a dad who was mad about cricket, absolutely mad about cricket is that spin bowlers were the chess players that they thought about where they were placing the ball and they could place the ball with such accuracy and play tactically whereas the fast bowlers fired cannons at the batsman. You know they were just too quick like lightning speed and really hard. You had a real job as a batsman, both deadly in their own way. But India at this point sort of goes down interestingly the spin bowling route and Pakistan sticks with pace.
- [36:41]
Anita Anand
Is that true today? You still have the role Pindi Express. I remember what was his name?
- [36:45]
Tim Wigmore
Shah Bhakhtar. I mean to fast forward massively. But in the last this century have actually unearthed a really great soccer fast bowl and that has led injured to become much more effective than they were historically. But Pakistan until 2000 do a lot better than India in test cricket and they have these fast bowls. India doesn't really in the same way. So it's remarkable how this image, it's true in terms of what we see on the field and I think there is a sense of perception becomes a reality. If you tell people that India can't produce fastballers and young kids who are good at cricket think I'm not going to be a fast bowler.
- [37:14]
William Dalrymple
Yeah. And it just carries on.
- [37:15]
Anita Anand
When I first arrived in Delhi there was A very handsome figure on the party circuit called Tiger Patordi, who was the Nawab of Pataudi. And he was married to the equally glamorous Shamila Tagore, who was one of the very first Indian women to wear bikinis on early films. Water skiing in the 1950s. And is still very much around.
- [37:37]
William Dalrymple
Yeah, and she's still impossibly beautiful. I mean, really, these were very much.
- [37:41]
Anita Anand
The sort of the idols of Indian cricket in the kind of 1960s, weren't they?
- [37:45]
William Dalrymple
Tell us more about Tiger Patoldi. So, yeah, for those who don't know, what was he good at? How important was he to the Indian side?
- [37:52]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah, so he's this legendary figure. The I story is that he.
- [37:57]
William Dalrymple
He's.
- [37:57]
Tim Wigmore
He's 21. He's. Yeah, he's driving with teammates down in. In Sussex. People in the car get out 200 meters away from where, where they're dropping off, and he says, oh, I'll just stay. You know, I can't be bothered to have a walk. And then there's a car crash. He loses one eye. So he. And he's. He's this incredibly talented batsman, and yet with one eye, he's still able to forge a very good career as a test cricketer. And some people think had he maintained both eyes fully, he could have been one of the absolute stellar set of greats of all time as a cricketer. We talked about the sort of Nepo babies of the 1930s. Well, he has that background, but he actually has cricketing pedigree as well. But he grows up in a palace with 150 rooms. The family have over 100 servants, you know, seven or eight personal servants from childhood. And he has a chat with Ian Chapel, who's the very kind of rugged Australian captain. At one point, when Chapel's like, but what do you. Because this is an era when there's not really fully fully professional players outside England. So Chapel says, but what's your job? What do you actually do? And he just says, ian, I'm a bloody prince. And that shuts up Chapel. But Tony, he's not shy about flouting his credentials. So Heathrow, once he arrives and he's asked, who can vouch for you, you know, the ultimate kind of mic drop moment. He just says, the Queen.
- [39:12]
William Dalrymple
The Queen. Ask the Queen. Yes, she'll know me.
- [39:15]
Tim Wigmore
And of course, yeah, his father's played for both England in that Bodyline series we talked about before in the previous episode, and then as Captain, India in 1947 as well. So he's this charismatic figure He's a Muslim captain as well, which is interesting. Dynamic.
- [39:28]
Anita Anand
Too little side story to bring the beginning of this story and the end together. It was at that same palace which he had 100 servants in, that Aamir Khan filmed his next film after Lagan, which was Mangalpandi, starring the young Sam Darymple, then aged about four to four, who had a small role as Rani Mukherjee's son.
- [39:49]
William Dalrymple
And just finally, before we wrap this all up, where do India and Pakistan stand now when it comes to test cricket and particularly when they face each other? Is there something going on there?
- [39:59]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah, India and Pakistan are not currently playing against each other because the last test was in 2007. This is obviously called often the Asian Ashes and big on the Ashes and stuff, but I think the cricket, the Test cricket that's played between the countries has been very, very dull and attritional. And basically there's this fear of defeat has marked these games. So, you know, in all Test cricket history, 30% of matches are drawn India, Pakistan, it's 64%, you know, one point. There's 15 draws in 16 in the 1980s. And captains are just always sat off series unless they win. And the kind of fear of. Of defeat has been the kind of driving force more than the sense of chasing victory.
- [40:36]
Anita Anand
It was always said that Imran Khan got his job as Prime Minister, wasn't it, really? Because he was the only person that defeated India in a Test.
- [40:44]
Tim Wigmore
A few others, but it was, yeah, he did very, very well against India.
- [40:49]
Anita Anand
82. And you could hear the.
- [40:50]
Tim Wigmore
Yeah, 82. He did an alleged performance against India in 82. That's right.
- [40:54]
Anita Anand
And you could hear the roar of victories. Sort of 30 miles into India was the story so loud was the exclamation from Lahore.
- [41:02]
William Dalrymple
That's really interesting that neither side wants to take on the hatred of their own nation when they go back, if they lose to the other country. So they play to a draw. So they've both got that weighing on them.
- [41:10]
Tim Wigmore
If you prepare a certain type of wicket of pitch, it's harder to get batsman out and it encourages this safe cricket. And both countries would Prepare these until 1992. You don't have neutral umpires in Test matches and players from both sides say that the umpires are biased against them. So you go to India, it's an Indian umpire. If you go to Pakistan, it's Pakistan umpires. So with Javad, Me, Andad, he's a great Pakistani batsman. So normally the LBW rule is if you're hit on the leg in front of the stumps, you're giving out lbw. But he thinks the umpires are so biased that if he's hit on the leg anywhere, you know, regardless of where the stomps are, he'll be giving out lbw. So before going to India, he practices without pads, basically because he's saying I can't be on the legs so I'll be given out. So it actually impacts how the players play as well. And there's this fear of defeat as well. So the politics is there massively. And there's this incredible bit of history where the first visit that Jinnah's daughter ever makes to Pakistan is in 2004 for India v Pakistan cricket match.
- [42:08]
William Dalrymple
There's so many interesting stories and, you know, there's the story of Latamangeshkar who is the songbird of India, choosing her flat because it had a view over Lord's cricket ground because she was such a crazy cricket fan. And we could go on and on. It's been an absolute delight. Tim's book is called Test A History. It's out right now. Paperback's coming out pretty soon.
- [42:27]
Tim Wigmore
Get it for a Christmas present before.
- [42:28]
William Dalrymple
Get it for a Christmas present. If you're with the club, you'll meet Tim again. And if not, it's been so great having you till the next time we meet is goodbye from me, Anita Anand.
- [42:37]
Anita Anand
And goodbye from me, William Drimble.
- [42:41]
Tim Wigmore
And Doug. Here we have the Limu Emu in its natural habitat helping people customize their car insurance and save hundreds with Liberty Mutual. Fascinating. It's accompanied by his natural ally, Doug. Limu is that guy with the binoculars watching us.
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Anita Anand
Cut the camera.
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Tim Wigmore
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Tim Wigmore
Oh, no.
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