The impact that the sports journalist and administrator had on city cricket is deserving of a big honour during the Kanga League
The Dr HD Kanga Cricket League is scheduled to start on July 24, but this week’s rains could lead to a washout of the 68-year-old league’s first Sunday.
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Doubtless, the significance of this tournament has diminished. No more is Kanga League viewed as a channel for cricket talent, the barometer of batting technique and temperament and a weighing scale for wickets to get into the list of Mumbai Ranji Trophy probables.
Late sports journalist Sharad Kotnis (right) greets England cricket captain Keith Fletcher during the 1981-82 series in India. Pic/mid-day archives
Even a change in format a couple of years ago didn’t help bring back the charm of Mumbai cricket’s best loved tournament. The league has got back its monsoon flavour, but it’s clear that the best part of the Kanga League is its past.
It is at this time of the year that I remember one particular member of our profession — Sharad Kotnis. He was more than just a journalist. Kotnis managed junior cricket teams in the Gavaskar era and went on to become the Treasurer of Bombay Cricket Association. He was also the heartbeat of Sportsweek magazine for 17 years, before shifting to Afternoon Despatch & Courier (ADC), whose Wednesday sports specials in the monsoon months were dominated by Kanga League coverage.
Everyone in Mumbai and Indian cricket knew Kotnis. Friends called him ‘Doctor’.
GK Menon, who too was a local cricket administrator and journalist, remembers Kotnis’ first sporting love being hockey. “He worked at the Accountant General’s Office in Marine Lines and every evening during the hockey season, he hopped across to the Bombay Hockey Association to watch matches. He then started taking interest in the affairs of Shivaji Park Gymkhana (SPG). The SPG cricket team was overflowing with talent. We didn’t want those cricketers who couldn’t make the SPG squad move to other clubs, so we started Shivaji Park Youngsters (SPY) which Kotnis took charge of,” recalled 89-year-old Menon.
SPY was synonymous with Kotnis, whose most famous product was Sandeep Patil in the 1970s. Players like Chandrakant Pandit, Raju Kulkarni, Sanjay Manjrekar and even Sachin Tendulkar have played for this club in fair weather tournaments. Kotnis was a father figure to his boys. “When I think of people who are married to this great game, the first person who comes to mind is Kotnis. I started my club cricket career playing for SPY, which was a one-man army. Mr Kotnis was secretary, selector and mentor. I loved listening to his great cricketing stories which motivated me to achieve my goals,” Patil told me from the West Indies the other day.
Nadeem Memon remembered Kotnis yesterday as soon as he was elected cricket secretary of the Mumbai Schools Sports Association. “Kotnis was always seen on the maidans. I was a member of his team when it came to media coverage of the Kanga League, along with Pradeep Jadhav and Vinod Vasudeo. We had to feed him with scores and unusual occurrences in the league and he did his share of legwork too,” said Memon.
In the SPY tent, Kotnis was alert — be it with what was being entered in the scorebook or the action on the field. And if SPY were in a spot of bother, his nervousness showed. He suffered two heart attacks and entrusted Prakash Kelkar with the task of managing SPY. Kelkar is still the club’s secretary and carries out Kotnis’ traditional pre-Kanga League get-togethers.
Kotnis passed away on December 3, 1998 at the age of 70. Five years earlier, on Kotnis’ last day at the ADC, Behram Contractor wrote his Round and About column on his exiting sports editor. He dwelt on how both of them used to be in the same newsroom at the mid-day office in Tardeo: “He was still doggedly efficient; methodical, careful, averse to flashy journalism and bold headlines, quietly, though with occasional bursts of temper, bringing out the magazine week after week.”
Contractor ended his column on Kotnis with the words, “It is under his doctor’s advice and the pressures of his family that he is retiring today. Though that will be only after he has checked out his final pages tonight.”
Those pages always had a local flavour to it — a profile of a young sportsperson or a mug shot of a performer in a local tournament.
It’s never too late for the Mumbai Cricket Association to perpetuate the memory of Kotnis. How about calling the first day of action in the Kanga League as Sharad Kotnis Day?
mid-day’s group sports editor Clayton Murzello is a purist with an open stance. He tweets @ClaytonMurzello. Send your feedback to mailbag@mid-day.com
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