Kapil, Engineer to be inducted to USA Cricket Hall of Fame

Former Indian Test cricketers Kapil Dev and Farokh Engineer top the 2009 list of Inductees for the USA Cricket Hall of Fame awards.

Kapil, Engineer to be inducted to USA Cricket Hall of Fame

Former Indian Test cricketers Kapil Dev and Farokh Engineer top the 2009 list of Inductees for the USA Cricket Hall of Fame awards.

The Indian stalwarts will be honoured at a function in Hartford, Connecticut, USA on October 3.

Previous winners of the awards, which were instituted in 1981, include former Indian captain Sunil Gavaskar, ex West Indies skipper Viv Richards and former West Indian greats Alf Valentine, Lance Gibbs, Wesley Hall, Gordon Greenidge and Desmond Haynes.

According to its mission statement, the USA Cricket Hall of Fame is a "non-profit organisation dedicated to promote and develop the game in the US".

Kapil Dev was named as Indian cricketer of the century in 2002 by Wisden. He captained India to their maiden World Cup triumph in 1983 and is regarded as one of the greatest all-rounders to have played the game.
u00a0
Kapil Dev holds the record for the highest Test wickets between 1994 and 1999 and is the only player in the history of the game to have scored 4,000 runs and taken 400 wickets.

Engineer was a flamboyant batsman and agile wicketkeeper who was first choice 'keeper for the Rest of the World XI in England and Australia in the early 1970s.

Remember Madras?
He is still remembered for plundering 94 runs before lunch on the first day of the Madras Test against an attack consisting of West Indies greats Wesley Hall, Charlie Griffith, Garry Sobers and Lance Gibbs.

Engineer is currently in Mumbai with wife Julie on a television assignment for Neo Sports. They will leave on a train trip on the 7-star Darjeeling Express tomorrow.

The uber deluxe train travels from Mumbai to Udaipur, Jaipur, Delhi, Agra, Varanasi, Kolkata and Darjeeling and is the brainchild of Tim Littley of Manchester and GW Travel Co in conjunction with Le Passage.

"I just can't wait to get on the chook-chook gaadi," a beaming Engineer told KHALIDOSCOPE yesterday with child-like anticipation over breakfast at the Taj, where they are staying.