Memorabilia from city raconteur Rafique Baghdadi's collection takes us back to the early days of cricket in 1930s, when the Indian team toured England to play its first Test
Rafique Baghdadi at his residence. Pics/Shadab khan
The Indian team played its 500th test in Kanpur against New Zealand this September. The milestone left us wondering about the beginning of the journey when the Indian team travelled to England to play its first test at the Lords Cricket Ground led by Natwarsinhji Bhavsinhji, the Maharaja of Porbandar.
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The cricket-railway connect: (Left) A brochure of Bombay Pentangular with an advertisement for the Great Indian Peninsula Railway (GIP), urging people to visit different parts of the country to avail their newly introduced standard routes; (right) a souvenir for Laxmidas Rowji Tairsee, a business tycoon of the era
Our imagination got the much needed aid when raconteur and preserver of codes to the past, Rafique Baghdadi opened up his treasure box of cricket collectibles from the era at his Mazgaon home.
Team tribute: Some members of the team that travelled to England in 1932. (From top, anti-clockwise) SR Godambe, Jahangir Khan, Md Nissar, Cpt Joginder Singh, RD Marshal, Lt JG Navle
He led us to his room in a house that he says “could be over 100 years old.” We step into a world that is a bibliophile’s fantasy. Look left and you see a tome on Arab cinema, look right and there is some crime fiction, look beside the cupboards and you the piles of cinema collectibles and DVDs. There is enough to call it a treasure, thriving under the vigil of a master whose touch of care has not allowed dust to accumulate anywhere.
(Left) Full schedule of India’s 1932 tour. The team toured England in the 1932 season under the title, All-India team. One Test match was played at Lord’s Cricket Ground. This was the first Test played by India. England won by 158 runs after scoring 259 and 275-8 declared while India was bowled out for 189 and 187
He opened a wooden cupboard and in it, in a plastic box were the yellowing images of Indian cricket’s past. “It is quite amazing to look at them now. These pictures tell us so much. For example, you got scorebooks with brochures where you kept tally of the scores yourself,” he says, flipping through brittle paper.
Club for Parsis: The Elphinstone Club (a picture from the Pentangular brochure) had an important role to play in the city’s cricket history. Parsi students of Elphinstone High School had formed the club that later became an open club and one of the top Parsi teams of the 1870sClub for Parsis: The Elphinstone Club (a picture from the Pentangular brochure) had an important role to play in the city’s cricket history. Parsi students of Elphinstone High School had formed the club that later became an open club and one of the top Parsi teams of the 1870s
From a brochure, we discover frames of some team members who went on the tour, and a view of Lords that looks spectacularly filled for a Test match.
When an icon was snubbed: KSâu00c2u0080u00c2u0088Duleepsinghji, who has been identified here as the Sussex cricketer, declined the offer to lead the Indian team as he was the captain of the Sussex team and was expecting to be selected for the England team. The job went to the rather dapper (in picture) Nawab of Pataudi (Iftikhar Ali Khan) who has been described as a gentleman of England and Worcester
From his box of the cricket collection also emerged a brochure for the Bombay Pentangular, a cricket tournament of the different communities in the city which attained the Pentangular form only in 1937, when the fifth team, The Rest comprising Buddhists, Jews, and Indian Christians were included.
Burmese revelation: Rangoon (now Yangon), the largest city of Burma (Myanmar) had a cricket culture in the 1930s. England player Charles McCarthy played for Rangoon Gymkhana in their only first-class match, which came against the Marylebone Cricket Club in 1927 and played four Tests for England in 1931. This picture is of a Mohomedan Cricket Club of Rangoon in 1931
In its original form the tournament was played at the Bombay Gymkhana as the Presidency match between the Parsis and the Europeans of the city.
There is a lot more that intrigues. The style in which souvenirs were written and the way advertisements appeared. But history, as is the way with us, is mostly left uncared for, and its traces dissappear softly.
On song in the 1930s
Inder Sabha, a film with maximum songs was also released in 1932. It was one of the earliest sound films made in India, the very next year after Alam Ara, which was the first Indian talkie. It featured over 69 songs and was 211-minutes long. Themovie was made by Jamshedji Framji Madan’s company, Madan Theatre.
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