Speaking to the press at New Delhi on June 8, 2005, the former Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer stated:
“…Our two countries love cricket and the Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee and I both love cricket. So, we spent a good deal of time over the lunch talking about our respective cricket teams and their prospects. We think that what we should do between us, between Australia and India, is to have a touring exhibition of Sir Donald Bradman’s memorabilia here in India. And we think that this would be very popular and this exhibition of Bradman memorabilia would go to major centres in India- New Delhi, Calcutta, Bombay, Chennai and so on.”
This announcement appears intriguing because Bradman, all his life, had “declined” opportunities to undertake an extensive visit/tour India. However, Bradman continues to be revered in the sub-continent, a fact of life Downer seemed to be cashing in on. And the one time the Indians had the fortune, or rather misfortune, of facing Bradman was in 1947-8, when a just independent India toured “down-under”. This was the first India-Australia official cricket series and in 2007 we mark the sixtieth anniversary of this extraordinary tour of many firsts.
It was the first occasion that the Indians played official Test cricket against any side but England. Again, it was the first cricket tour that independent India had undertaken. And finally, it was the only occasion that the Indians had the opportunity of playing against Bradman.
For the record, the Indians lost the series 0-4, and this rout, it can be asserted, was almost solely orchestrated by Donald Bradman. Bradman, though 39, was still at his best and his scores- 156 for South Australia, 172 for an Australian XI, (his 100th first class hundred), 185 in the first Test, 132 and 127 not out in the third, 201 in the fourth and 57 retired hurt in the fifth bear testimony to his contemptuous domination of the Indian attack. Amidst the ruin, the lone star was the nation’s premier batsman- Vijay Samuel Hazare.
At Adelaide, in the fourth Test of the tour, the Indians began their first innings facing a daunting Australian total of 674. Though Amarnath and Mankad started well, with the former scoring a strokeful 46, half the side was soon bundled out for 133. It was then that Hazare found form. With an able ally in Phadkar, the Australian crowd witnessed a spectacular recovery and the Indians ended the day at a respectable 299 for 5. Eventually with Hazare out for 116 and Phadkar making 123, the Indians were all out for 381 and followed on.
In the second innings the Indians were once again under pressure and once again it was Hazare to the rescue. As the contemporary newspapers noted, “It didn’t matter what the ball was, on or outside the off stump, what its height or pace, it was played with amazing certainty…It was a display of batsmanship, which has very seldom been equaled, certainly not surpassed and never dwarfed. It was not so much the pace at which the ball travelled. It was the supreme artistry of it all.”
Looking back at that Adelaide Test, Hazare had mentioned to me during a conversation in October 2004, only a few days before he breathed his last, "Bradman seemed impressed with my batting and we became really close friends afterwards. Some years on, he even found time to write a foreword for my book."
From the very start therefore, cricket has been a vehicle for both Australia and India to express national achievement and ambition. Cricket relations were strengthened under Prime Minister Gough Whitlam (1972-75) whose enlightened attitude towards India, and Asia generally, helped create Australian attitudes capable of more independent foreign policy formation, influenced more by regional factors than by the imperatives of its traditional Western alliance. This was helped by the enthusiastic response to Whitlam by the equally independent Prime Minister of India, Mrs Indira Gandhi. Improved political relations impacted upon cricket as well allowing Australia’s more structured economy to harness the economic worth of cricket in India.
This transformation has only been cemented in the years since. For example, India’s tour of Australia in 2003-4 assumed tremendous significance back home, interest stimulated by the spectacular individual performances by the Indians in the Test series.
The growing significance of Indo-Australian cricket has had a perceptible impact on tourism “down-under” as well. In the wake of India’s series in 2004, no less than 3000 Indians arrived in Australia to cheer their team, a first for Indian sport. Thus it is no surprise to know that bilateral trade between India and Australia during the calendar year 2004 touched a record A$ 6.54 billion.
These figures, one can confidently assert, will only increase during the current tour, which has already been billed in India as “The New Ashes”. With a growing history adding gloss to this rivalry, with time this label might well prove true.
