India’s Blind Cricket Team Captain Wants to be a Coach : Bangalore

On Sunday morning, Shekar Naik, India’s blind cricket team captain, whose vision extends only to 6 metres, will play his last official tournament.



Shekar Naik (standing, second from left) with the Indian blind cricket team


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After a set of two friendly 20-over matches against the Australian team organised by Samarthanam Trust for the Disabled and The Eye Foundation on April 13 and 14, he wants to turn coach for the team that he has led to victory in last year’s T-20 World Cup, and on several other glorious occasions.

Sitting up eagerly in his chair, speaking in a soft and careful manner, eyes always crinkled into a smile, Naik poses a contrast to the celebrity stardom of our national cricketers. Naik is the quintessential boy next door.

Born in 1986 in a small village in Shimoga district, Naik struggled with complete blindness due to a genetic illness that he had inherited from his mother, till he was eight years old. 

“My mother and all her sisters were blind. In those days, I used to think everyone was blind,” he laughs.

“One day I fell down into a river and hurt myself. The very next day, some people from a hospital came for an eye camp to my village. My mother took me to them. They took me to Bangalore and I got an eye operation. After that operation, my vision has increased by 30 to 40 per cent,” he narrates.

Three months later, his father passed away. He was only nine years old then, and he joined school for the
first time to begin his formal education.

Two years later, his mother passed away, leaving her only child him behind without any family.

It was in school that Naik learnt cricket, and perhaps it was his mother who was his greatest inspiration.

“The people in my village Harakere called me names because I was blind, but mother had always stood by me and reassured me that I could achieve great things. That’s what made me stick on to cricket as well,” he explains.

Career

His school physical exercise trainer shaped Naik’s interest in cricket, pushing him to work hard and develop his skills.

In 2000, he was selected for the State team. The turning point in his career was undoubtedly the South Zone tournament in which he scored a smashing 249 runs against Kerala.

Next up came the World Cup series in Chennai, where he was given a chance to play opening batsman and bowler and where he bagged ‘Man of the Match’ title against Australia and Sri Lanka.

In 2004, the team went on its first international match, where it visited Pakistan, and he scored 198 runs -- his highest score in internationals.In 2006, he was the only person from Karnataka who was selected for the Indian team, he tells us proudly.

“Later in 2007, we visited UK, where I won ‘Man of the Match’ award twice. We won all the matches that tournament; it was a whitewash,” he declares. 

“In 2010, I was chosen as the captain of the cricket team, and that was when I finally believed I had made my mother proud and achieved something. In 2012, team Pakistan came down to India for the first ever T20 World Cup for the Blind. Nine countries participated then, and it was probably one of the most memorable moments as we won the series,” he says.

New Players

“Playing the Australian team hasn’t been too much of a challenge for us in the past,” says the 28-year-old.

“Right now, we and Pakistan stand as the strongest teams.”

So, he explains, seven of the eleven members from across ten states (Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Kerala, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Gujarat, Punjab, Haryana, Bihar and Rajasthan) are newcomers. They have not played international tournaments yet and have been given this opportunity to hone their skills for the T20 World Cup coming up in November.

“They will gain confidence too. I’m really looking forward to the world cup, and I  share my experience with the new players and see the team do well,” says Naik.

Safety

Since all players are visually challenged to different degrees -- four fall under the B1 category, who are completely blind; three under B2, who can see up to three metres; and the remaining four are B3 category players, who can see up to 6 metres away.

The wicket keeper, ‘the father of the match’, has to coordinate between the other members of his team. “He calls out the name of the player towards whom the ball is travelling. Using these inputs and the sound the fibre-plastic ball makes, we can even catch sometimes,” he adds.

It’s not just between members of a team that verbal communication plays an important role.

“Before the bowler bowls, he asks the batsman if he’s ready,” he shares. And only after an affirmative response does he bowl with an underarm throw. In addition to this, the World Blind Cricket Council conducts medical check-up before a team undertakes an international tour, Naik says.

Naik, who works as the fund-raising coordinator of Samarthanam, rues that the support that the Indian Blind Cricket Team receives from the government, corporate companies or even the public is negligible. “Why should it be this way? Whether it’s us that wins or the Indian Cricket Team, it’s the national flag that we fly, it’s India that shares the glory. Then?” he asks.

Several fellow members of the team, he informs us, work in factories, earning about `5,000 a month. But whenever there’s a match, they they have to take a break or let go of their jobs. “Once they go back, they have to find a new job. In my entire 12 years as a cricketer, I haven’t got a government job, but if these players do, it will help tremendously,” he says.

Also, if the team plays under the BCCI-ICCI banner, people will ta why can’t BCCI and ICCI support us tooke it more seriously and garner for them various forms of support, he feels.

“In Pakistan, the blind team gets all the benefits as it too comes under the main cricket body. Blind cricketers there even get a match fee, unlike us,” he says, adding that there are 45,000 visually challenged cricketers in the country.

Naik is a fan of Virender Sehwag, whose batting style and confidence he admires. But while he has not seen the Arjuna awardee in real life, he has met Robin Singh, Mohammed Kaif, V V S Lakshman, Rahul Dravid, Adam Gilchrist, Fazal Mahmood  and  Saurav Ganguly. “Yuvraj Singh even played with us in our annual Lucknow tournament once, blindfolding himself,” recalls Naik.

The matches will be played at Alur KCA Grounds and Electronic City PES College Grounds on April 13 and 14 respectively, 11 am onwards.



Source : The New Indian Express , 12th Apil 2014