Separate Gates, Separate Dressing Rooms
In the first episode of Well Caught with Giri and Raghu, we travel in time to an age when caste and class divide the pavilion. On and off the field, cricket reflects the discrimination that prevails in colonial societies.
It’s a beautiful day for cricket. The turf is green. The radio is crackling. The scoreboard is ticking. The crowd is cheering. And the sun is beginning to set on the British Empire.
We travel in time to an age when caste and class divide the pavilion. On and off the field, cricket reflects the discrimination that prevails in colonial societies. Players are segregated, teams assigned ethnic names, and coloured players docked their pay for using gates meant for white Englishmen.
Yet, it is this golden age that gives us greats like Ranjitsinhji and Duleepsinhji, and later Griffith and Sobers. Many new flags flutter in the winds of change as the colonies assert their independence. A game designed to cement the Commonwealth takes on a life of its own and engenders a new world order.
Credits:
Akshay Ramuhalli, Bijoy Venugopal, Bruce Lee Mani, Narayan Krishnaswamy, Prashant Vasudevan, Sananda Dasgupta, Seema Seth, Shraddha Gautam, Supriya Joshi and Velu Shankar
Explore further:
Books:
- Mid-Wicket Tales — From Trumper to Tendulkar (Sage India, 2014)
- From Mumbai to Durban: India’s Greatest Tests (Juggernaut, 2016)
YouTube:
- Cricket Giants Of 1890s (0)
- Rare Footage of English and Australian Cricket Teams (1905) | Sporting History
- 1972: Gavaskar, Venkat, Solkar visit Ranjitsingh’s home in Nawanagar
- Shehnai Recital of Ustad Bismillah Khan | Part 1
- All India Radio Signature tune
- England & Australia 1948 | The Lord’s Ashes Test | Classic Cricket Films
- Maryan — Official Teaser 3
Before you go…
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Well Caught with Giri and Raghu — cricket in sun and shadow
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Captains And Musical Chairs
Discover exciting vignettes about the history of Indian cricket in the second episode of Well Caught with Giri and Raghu
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Spinning Through The Seventies
For a game that favoured white in more ways than one, the Seventies brought a burst of colour. Team India’s answer to the belligerent and martial pace of the times came in the form of the legendary Indian spin quartet of Bishen Bedi, Erapalli Prasanna, Bhagwat Chandrasekhar, and S Venkataraghavan, who responded with their gentle and non-violent bowling. Listen to Episode 3 to know more.
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World Cup Whirlwind
The Eighties saw India on the ascent, aided by a lineup of fluent stroke-makers in Dilip Vengsarkar and Mohammad Azharuddin, and tenacious all-rounders in Kapil Dev and Ravi Shastri. The decade would end with a 16-year-old boy who would walk out into the middle to boldly take a searing Pakistani seam attack on the chin. His name? Sachin Ramesh Tendulkar. Listen to Episode 4 of Well Caught with Giri and Raghu for the full story.
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Late Cut
From the colourful radio commentaries that brought the game alive in the early days of Test Cricket to the elaborate theatrics of T20 in modern television broadcasting, cricket has travelled the distance. Reliving the defining moments of the beautiful game, Giri and Raghu hang up their gloves in this series finale of Well Caught.