I played under three permanent skippers in my Test career — Nari Contractor before Tiger Pataudi and Ajit Wadekar. The last two mentioned were like chalk and cheese, but both grand men. Ajit, or Jitya as I used to call him, was far less flamboyant than Tiger; more serious you could say.

The pinnacle of his captaincy career was the series victories over West Indies and England. I was not part of the team in the West Indies but after the Oval Test win over Ray Illingworth's England which I played a role in, he insisted that I come to India with the rest of the team for whom a big welcome was planned.