Centenary cycle

It has pedaled to 100 years but the Parsee Cyclists Sports Club is not a club of cyclists! For a good part of its century it has pitched it right in cricket! Polly Umrigar, Nari Contractor, Farokh Engineer and Rusi Surti, legends in their lifetime, have donned the Club’s colors, moving on to don India colors. Parsee Cyclists have rolled the ball successfully in hockey and football as well, from its early years till the authorities stopped, some years ago, these games from being played competitively in the maidans (open grounds) of south Bombay.

Founded by cyclists Mancherji Kapadia, Kaikhusroo Mistry and Eruch­sha Baria in 1909, the Club’s centenary celebrations on October 9, 2009 brought out the nostalgia and spirit of sport. The old boys, led by 75-year-young Contractor who is also the Club’s president, came out to play a 10-over match against the present Parsee Cyclists’ cricketers. The team tent at Azad Maidan, the only survivor of the around 20 Parsi clubs that used to dot the maidan earlier, witnessed a jashan prior to the match. The evening was the time to uncork the bubbly at the Wodehouse Gymkhana, with friends and well-wishers turning out in large numbers, sharing food, fun, bonhomie and back-slapping memories.

(Top) Jamshed Irani cuts centenary cake as (fromleft) Mehli Irani, Nari Contractor, Zarine and Dadi Palkhivala and Firdaus Shroff applaud; Contractor inaugurates the 2009 Kanga League ; Below : Present managing committee (from left) Firdaus Shroff, Dadi Palkhivala, Homi Mehta, Nari Contractor, Fali Shroff, Rohinton Iranpur and Behzad Devadwalla

"One hundred years is a long innings and it is difficult to cover this period in short, but I will run through the salient features,” said Contractor in his presidential address. The name is odd but the Club was so called because the founders were cyclists, he told the gathering. Importantly, it was hockey, football and volleyball that were the staples in the first few decades. "There were as many as 26 Parsi teams which would come from all parts of the country, including Karachi to take part in tournaments. Cricket came later and hockey and football disappeared from the map of the Club. Now, unfortunately, the same seems to be happening to cricket. What has happened to Parsi sports and sportsmen I don’t know,” Contractor stated sadly.

With big money being the name of the game and contacts and clout counting for more than membership, the Club has found itself somewhat stumped in the last few years. Contractor gave the present field settings: "We have gone from baug to baug to promote the sport. On the first day we had 65 boys. A fortnight later there were barely nine to 10 remaining. Priorities have changed, commitments have changed. You give everything free, but the answer is ‘Who will play all day? Two hours is fun.’”

The 1960s saw the pinnacle of Parsi cricket with four Zoroastrians in the Test team, the president continued. Contractor recalled that at a felicitation function at the Parsee Gymkhana prior to the Indian team’s departure for the West Indies tour of 1962, he had jocularly remarked that with a population of around 97,000 at that time, the Parsis had four cricketers in the squad. If we had three lakh Parsis, we could probably have raised a whole team, he had then quipped. "I was the first victim of that stupid boast (being felled by a Charlie Griffith bouncer which almost killed him and virtually ended his cricketing career). But there was so much enthusiasm. Parsee Cyclists have played and won in the ‘A’ division of the Kanga League. We are now relegated to the ‘F’ division. The last Parsi to have been part of the Test squad was Rusi Jeejeebhoy. Hosi Amroliwalla almost made it to the team. Bombay’s representation was so high — the late Behram Irani, Behram Govadia were among the players for Bombay. The late Rustom Dadachanji was a fatherly figure. One of our members, Dr Firoze Motiwala, has participated in the Club’s silver, golden and now centenary celebrations! It’s a sad day today that we can’t do anything (to turn the tide). With God’s grace, something (good) will happen,” Contractor stated.

Club cricket team with founder Mancherji Kapadia and former president Rustom Dadachanji (seated third and sixth from left). In the picture also are Test cricketers Nari Contractor (standing second from right), Polly Umrigar and Rusi Surti (seated first and second from left) and Farokh Engineer (front row, extreme right); Below: hockey heyday

"Today we are celebrating not just a century but the enduring spirit of cricket. Truly it is said ‘cricket is more than play, it is worship in the sun,’” enthused Fali Shroff, the Club’s vice president and former player, narrating incidents that reflected the motivation behind this worship. "Veteran Mehli Irani was one committed player. He played Ranji Trophy for Bombay,” Shroff narrated. Cracking a first ball four against a Commonwealth team pace bowler, Irani responded to the sledging ‘if you do that again I will crack your ribs’ by slamming three fours thereafter and cracking the bowler’s confidence!

At the Farokh Engineer Benefit Match, there were speedsters like Joel Garner, Malcolm Marshall, Michael Holding and Dennis Lillee, Shroff continued. "Enough to make the toughest batsman quake. But not Rohinton Iranpur (who still comes down from California each year to play for the Club team in the Kanga League) who chose to face the onslaught without his safety protector. Of course he did not do that intentionally. He simply forgot to wear one and by the time he realized his mistake, it was too late. He was out there facing them!”

In an important Kanga League match, (which has players from all communities) Kishore Kuvavala, who was present at the centenary function, was hit by a ball rising from a wet wicket. "Seriously injured above the eye, a bleeding Kuvavala had to be rushed to Bombay Hospital, where he was stitched up. Instead of going home and resting, as advised, he not only came back to the maidan but took up the bat and ensured that the match was won against heavy odds,” Shroff recalled. "Similarly our late friend Govadia had played a winning innings after being hit on the face. And Contractor, of course, is a living example of such bravery and sterling sportsmanship after taking a hit on the head from one of the world’s deadliest pace bow­lers.”

The special souvenir brought out on the occasion of the centenary was released by chief guest Dr Jamshed J. Irani, former Tata Steel managing director who is on the board of Tata Sons. "My family has strong connections with cricket. My father was an avid cricketer who remembered 1936 as being the last year the Parsis won the Quadrangulars in Nagpur and not the year his son was born!” Irani quipped. Players at that time wore very thin gloves and having been hit on the hand innumerable times, several of his digits were broken and inflexible. If I had achieved more in cricket than as a captain of industry, he would have been very happy, Irani jested. The Jiji Irani Challenge Cup Cricket Tournament is held each year in his memory at different venues in rotation. "It’s sad there is no Parsi youth at the national level. I hope the future will bring better times than what Contractor has described,” Irani said.

Mementos were presented, some in absentia, to a long line of Club stalwarts — true grit Contractor, known for his charm and craft Engineer, fleet-footed Surti, "the grand old man of the Club” Mehli Irani who played in the Kanga League continuously for over 50 years, stylish batsman Amroliwalla, Ranji Trophy player Zubin Bharucha, all rounder Noshir Tantra, Club honorary secretary Homi Mehta who batted at number five in a team full of Test players, Fali Shroff who has worked tirelessly for the Club, Hoshang Dadachanji, Homi Kolsawalla, treasurer Dadi Palkhivala who would say never a no for football and hockey, Motiwala, Iranpur and Firdaus Shroff (father of tennis star Kyra) who took over the captaincy of the team from Mehli Irani and was the main organizer of the evening’s function. "We salute you, Firdaus, for your selfless loyalty and love for our Club (over a 29-year period),” said Iranpur in his vote of thanks.

The Club football team. Soli Poona­walla is fifth from left (standing)

Other well-known players who have represented the Club are Abbas Ali Baig, Ghulam Parkar, Salim Durrani and Karsan Ghavri, notes Firdaus Shroff in the souvenir. Late president Rustom Dadachanji played a major role in forming a winning combination from 1950 for a decade or two, with the Club being crowned champions of the ‘A’ division of the Kanga League in 1953, ’62, ’64 and ’66 jointly with National and Shivaji Park Gymkhana, states the souvenir.

Touching upon the hockey and football score sheets, Palkhivala notes: "Soli Poonawalla had been selected to the Indian football team for the Olympics, he was such a good player.” But at the last moment, in one of the strange decisions Indian sports administrators are known for, he was dropped and another player taken in his place. Palkhivala himself has the distinction of having played competitive hockey till he was 42! Son-in-law of founder Mancherji Kapadia, Palkhivala has been associated with the Parsee Cyclists right from 1958: "I have looked after hockey and football single-handedly for 14 years and was playing right up to 1984. Our team with all Parsi players was in the third division of BHA (Bombay Hockey Association) tournaments through the ’70s and ’80s. Our performance was average. We were neither at the top nor at the bottom.” Earlier, in the 1920s, 30s and 40s, there were 23 Parsi hockey teams! Karachi, Hyderabad-Secunderabad, Poona would send two to three teams, the rest would be from Bombay, Calcutta, etc. Now there is not a single Parsi team, he regrets, adding that there used to be even a girls’ team in the past.

The Club’s cricket team, however, has had and still has a number of Parsi players aged 20-30 and some over, says Fali Shroff. Burzin Mehta, Behzad Devadwalla, Hormuz Malao, Farhad Daruwalla, Rushad Prabhoo, Neville Achadwalla, Eric Bacha, Kaiwan Medhora, Firoz Deboo, Soli Karanjia, Zarir Kasad, Zubin Aibara and Zubin Minocherhomji are some of the names he gives Parsiana, with a couple of them showing good promise. Homi Mehta, who has been honorary secretary of the Young Zoroastrian Cricket Club for 10 years and Parsee Cyclists for the last two decades, supervises the day-to-day affairs and visits the Club tent regularly. "The ground is well looked after. There is no encroachment. Things are manageable,” he asserts.

The days of tea and khari biscuits at the maidan ordered from Irani restaurants, rounds of rummy or chess, white tarpaulin on the green and kerosene lanterns, earthen pots filled daily with well water are long past, but Parsee Cyclists "will definitely survive,” asserts Fali Shroff. The Parsee Cyclists Sports Club has given many an opportunity to enjoy the game. "The important thing is to get out there and play by the rules and to realize that the rules we play by are the rules we bring to life,” the vice president declared.