On Women’s Day, a nod to Sharad Pawar’s contribution to women’s cricket

(from left) Dilip Vengsarkar, Professor Ratnakar Shetty and Sharad Pawar at the launch of Shetty's account of his BCCI years on March 8 in Mumbai.

It was a happy coincidence that on International Women’s Day, Ratnakar Shetty acknowledged the role Sharad Pawar had played in growing women’s cricket in India. He also said the former Maharashtra Chief Minister had helped the widows of deceased Indian cricketers receive a pension from the Board.

Shetty, the former BCCI stalwart, launched his book On Board: My Years in BCCI (Rupa Publications) on March 8 at the Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai.

Shetty’s was an unconventional route to the top of the BCCI pyramid. He was a chemistry professor at Wilson College in Mumbai, and got into cricket administration out of love for the game. He started at the Mumbai Cricket Association. Soon, his dedication, no-nonsense approach and loyalty was noticed by players and influential figures such as Pawar, not just a prominent politician but also a BCCI president in the making.

Shetty, known simply as ‘Professor’ in Indian cricket circles, rose to become BCCI secretary, and later its Chief Administrative Officer and General Manager (Game Development).

Pawar was present at the book launch, along with former India captain Dilip Vengsarkar.

Shetty said that before Pawar’s entry into BCCI, administrators mostly paid lip service to women’s cricket. There was no real action. Then, in 2006, when Pawar was BCCI president, the Women’s Cricket Association of India merged with the Board.

“For years, before Mr Pawar (came into BCCI), I would see that women’s cricket would be on the agenda for every meeting. And it would get postponed,” Shetty said. “Even when he announced that women’s cricket be merged with the BCCI, some people said, ‘Why are we taking on this hassle? We’ll give them money, let them run their own cricket’. But he (Pawar) said ‘Nothing doing, this is my decision as the President of the BCCI’.”

Shetty credited Pawar with two other major changes in Indian cricket. One was starting a pension scheme for former players, including for widows of deceased ex-India players.  The other was giving the Indian Premier League (IPL) the administrative push, even though Shetty acknowledged the tournament was the brainchild of Lalit Modi, once a BCCI darling who later became a persona non grata.

“He [Pawar] brought in first-class cricketers [into the pension scheme, in addition to those who had played for India], and most important, the widows of international cricketers,” Shetty said.

As for the IPL, Shetty said, “I don’t think but for him the IPL would have started. It was Lalit Modi’s brainchild. There was a meeting in Singapore, and Saheb [Pawar] told me, ‘You go with Lalit, and tell me what that meeting was all about’. It was a meeting to plan the IPL. Mr Bindra (the late I.S. Bindra), myself and Lalit were there. And that was in 2007. After that Mr Pawar called a meeting of the board and said, ‘We are starting IPL’. These were his words. Not asking whether we should or not, but that we are starting the IPL.”