Hooked for life: Shashi Tharoor remembers the first Test match he saw live

In the winter of 1963, a battalion of Englishmen was in India for a bilateral Test series. The visitors were up against not just the local cricketers but also an assortment of maladies. By the time the second Test got underway in Bombay, the ranks of the English were so depleted that Hanumant Singh, the hosts’ 12th man, switched sides and appeared as a substitute fielder.

Novelist-MP Shashi Tharoor, then a scrawny schoolboy, recalls the match in vivid detail.

“It was the first Test I saw. I was seven and my dad took me to Brabourne Stadium. Budhi Kunderan was at the crease and he hit a six into the section of the stands where I was. It practically landed at my feet. A few balls later, Kunderan attempted another six and this time it landed short of the boundary. And then he hit the ball again in the air. As Titmus took a steepling catch at mid-off, Kunderan hurled his bat into the air while running, caught it as it fell down, and ran all the way back to the pavillion. I was hooked for life,” Tharoor said during a recent event.