I started playing cricket when I was 4 years old, the year was 1999. We used to play with rubber balls which costed 10 ruppes back then, instead of proper cricket bats, we used to ask our grandfather or uncles to prepare some cricket bat for us.
I still remember those days we used to play from morning to evening on weekends and holidays.
I also remember that, we used to bunk classes in primary school to watch 2003 world cup matches on TV and if we could not , we used to bring a radio to school to listen to the match.
we used to prepare pitches in our farms when crop cutting was done. Those days were most beautiful days of my life.
The first encounter with leather ball was in 2006 when I was taken to jaipur for some medical checkup and there I saw some international players practicing in nets which were established near some road. I can still remember the sound of that leather ball hitting the bat.
When I started to paste cropped images of my ideals in one of my empty notebook, and paste some posters of them in my room, my parents realised that I am serious about cricket and one night they took the notebook and all posters and set them on fire.
I was heartbroken and cried a lot that morning..and accepted that I will not play cricket anymore.
I did not play cricket from 2006 to 2015 and focued entirely on studies. Cricket was not my thing and was replaced by physics and mathematics.
When I could not get admission in IITs for physics major, I thought to join armed forces but I was not able to clear interviews.
I realised that I can also enter after my Masters, so I thought to take NCC C certificate, but there also I was not able to clear the selection.
That rejection made me realise how physically weak I was, I was not into any sports back then. I then started running for a year and I achieved 2.5 km in 9 minutes and 14 seconds. I was happy that I could run that fast. But I lost weight and became very thin.
I got myself injured by running 10kms two consecutive days and turns out the injury was due to lack of proper guidance (I ran on toes only), It took me 6 months to recover from that injury.
Meanwhile I started playing cricket again in 2015. I was so bad that I did not know how to hold the bat properly. I thought to learn it properly so got myself enrolled into Lalbhai Contractor stadium in Surat. I used to go there every day. They used to train us mostly on fitness and fielding. I trained there for 2 months and then I had to study for exams.
Next year in 2016, I changed the academy and there I focused mainly on batting. Even after that I realised that cricket is not my sports as the output was minimal.
I then switched to sprint training and gym. my best was 100m in 13 seconds. But learning cricket was one of my childhood dreams and I wanted to achieve it at any cost.
My paraents were not in favour of cricket as they thought it will affect my studies. I then promised them that I will play cricket only after I become financially independent.
I completed my Masters in 2019 and started preparing for various jobs, covid gave me time to explore multilple things like programming, ethical hacking, quantum computing, fitness etc.
In 2021, I was selected as a PhD scholar in IISc Bangalore. I then thought to play cricket again as I was financially independent now and IISc had a cricket club and is Institute Member of KSCA.
I came on 31st December 2021 to Bangalore and started playing cricket from 1st January 2022.
Below are some captured moments :
