Garry Sobers scored more than 8000 runs at an average of 57, hit 26 hundreds, claimed 235 wickets at 34 runs per wicket, and bagged 109 catches. He has a simple enough explanation for this legendary fecundity. “For most of my international career, I was playing for two.” The other one being Collie Smith, who…
Category: Biographical
KAROLY TAKACZ : I AM HERE TO LEARN
Authority. Always a vicious cunt. Fate. Ever the mean bitch. Together they conspired to deny Karoly Takacz his dream of participating at the Olympics, not once, but thrice. The Hungarian Army Sergeant was one of the best contemporary shooters in the world, but was not even considered as a probable for the Berlin Olympics, because…
The Essence of Al Pacino (Poem)
Of Al’s fire and the baritone, What can I say? The gaze as intense as his might singe dry hay. The man moves like a gazelle, Still the best in the fray, Let him talk and talk to make his point, Just shoot away. The air in his lungs, The power in his voice, The…
Dharmaveer : The Anand Dighe Biopic that foretold the current Revolt
Dharmaveer: Mukkam Post Thane (available on Zee5), the Marathi biopic of the Shiv Sena strongman, Anand Dighe, was released in May 2022. Aside from presenting Dighe (who passed away in 2001) and the Thane Shiv Sena unit as virtually autonomous, the film also strongly made the point that the party had grown powerful only by…
My Experiments with Brahmcharya – An Exercise in Narcissism
Not everyone slept with the Great Soul with their express consent. The wife of his nephew was told to go near him and help out with his experiments. She was sixteen, recently married and disinclined to take off her clothes in the company of the revered septuagenarian. She was nudged to oblige on the pretext…
Ask PERARIVALAN if he feels Sorry? (Poem)
Kill the leader of a nation, Go to jail, Spend two lifetimes inside prison, Never give up the quest for your own freedom, Get freed, eventually. Come back home to a hero’s welcome, You killed an unsuspecting man after all, Who did not have any inkling that death was approaching, But that was his problem,…
The FALL of ROY- An Obituary for Andrew Symonds (Poem)
( I wrote this poem in 2009. Pup had refused to stand-by Symo, and the latter was sent home by the Australian team management. His career seemed to be as good as over.) Warnie’e era was over, the Pigeon had flown, The explosive Gilly retired, giant Haydos gone, Suckers took over the Cricket Down Under,…
कैसे डूब गया दिनकर दक्षिण के दूर दिशांचाल में ?
जिन दिनकर को समस्त भारतवर्ष ने राष्ट्रवादी चेतना एवं वीर रस के प्रखरतम राष्ट्रकवि के रूप मे जाना, उन्हीं रामधारी सिंह को जीवन के अंतिम वर्षों में विरक्ति-सी हो गयी थी । उनका आखिरी समय बहुत अवसाद में कटा । मद्रास में बीती अपनी अंतिम संध्या पर दिनकर ने डायरी में लिखा- “सब कुछ पाकर…
God Bowls a Googly, Warne Plays for Leg Break (Obituary)
Shane Warne was never about innocence, he was always the romance of cricket. He did not play the sport like boys do, he was always an adult playing mind-games. He did not approach cricket like a game of chance or glorious uncertainties, he plied his trade by luring, teasing, testing, trapping and outfoxing the opponents….
Gasoline Formula, a Programmed Prodigy and a Pig’s Heart- Bizarre News from the mid-90s
The successful implant of a GM Pig’s heart in a human recipient by the surgeons of Maryland took me back to the mid-90s. Dr Dhaniram Baruah, in January 1997, had implanted porcine blood-pump on a 32-year old patient in Sonapur, Assam. The patient had survived for seven days, after which he had developed hyper-acute rejection,…
Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit in Conversation with Three World Leaders
Besides being the daughter of Motilal Nehru and younger sister of Jawaharlal Nehru, Vijaya Lakshmi Pandit was among the most influential diplomats of independent India. She was sent as India’s first Ambassador to the USSR(1947-49). After that she represented the country in the US and Mexico between 1949 and 1951. She was elected the first…
बंसल सर : गणित के जिस गुरु ने हमें सिखाया हास्य-विनोद
मास्टर गणित के थे , पढ़ाई लेकिन ज़िंदगी । गणित , और कोई भी अन्य विषय, कितना विनोदपूर्ण हो सकता है, यह विनोद जी ही नहीं समझाते तो समझाता कौन ? लेखक, पत्रकार या कोमेडियन होते तो भी बम्पर हिट रहते, पर फिर कोटा नगरी का कायाकल्प नहीं हो पाता । सत्रह से उन्नीस साल…
Abhinav Pancholi 