Posts Tagged ‘Captains’
Mohammad Azharuddin son hopes to make it big at dad’s happy hunting ground
Posted on: January 5, 2009
His father Mohammad Azharuddin began his career at Eden Gardens and now an 18-year-old Mohammad Ashaduddin, called for the Kolkata Knight Riders selection trials, hopes the venue will do the magic for him as well in his quest to make it big in cricket.
A product of St John’s Academy — a club where VVS Laxman learned his basics — Ashaduddin is yet to make it big anywhere, but he is hpoing that the KKR call-up will help him establish in the big league.
The left-handed opener said: “I have heard a lot about Eden Gardens from my father… It was one of his favourite grounds, having made his debut (against England in 1984-85). “It’s a great opportunity for me to prove myself if I get a chance. It can well be the turning point if I can cash in on the opportunity. I am very excited abou the call-up.”
One of the most successful India captains, Azhar, boasts of a 107.5 average, 860 runs from seven Tests at the Eden. In ODIs, the former middle-order batsman has 332 runs at an average of 47.42 from nine matches. Unlike his father, Ashaduddin, popularly known as Abbas, loves to play attacking shots which he says come in handy in the Twenty20 format.
“I have learnt cricket watching my father…so he is my first coach. But I have my style of play and I don’t want to play like my father. My father had a God’s gifted talent. I will never get there. I just like to be myself and perform well being a cricketer.”
“I think my style of play will suit the Twenty20 format. I have an attacking approach… I like to pull and Ganguly’s stepped-out shot was my favourite,” Ashauddin, who plays for East Marredpally CC in the Hyderabad’s A division league (two-day format) and has four fifties in six innings this year, added.
Ashauddin, who is also a part-time off-spinner, agreed there are a lot of expecations that a star-son has to face but is confident of shrugging off pressure. “There is pressure when you are born to a legendary father. But on the field I will be just a cricketer and try to play as the situation demands.”
Asked to compare his father and Sourav Ganguly — two of India’s most successful captains — the youngster chose to laugh it away: “It’s tough to answer… Ganguly was also a great leader and it was a dream come true for me meeting the former India captain.”
He added that Australian hard-hitting opener Matthew Hayden is his all time favourite, while he also admires Yuvraj Singh among the Indians. Incidentally the KKR probables also includes another cricketer son Shatrunjay Gaekwad, son of former India coach Aunshuman Gaekwad. Left-handed batsman Shatrunjay has played for Baroda.
Ashauddin is part of a pool of 44 cricketers selected from all over the country to go in for a three-day selection trial to be conducted by coach John Buchanan and Ganguly for Kolkata Knight Riders. The camp will begin tomorrow.
In a major New year bonanza for the armed forces, the Prime Minister’s Office has informed the Defence Ministry that the armed forces personnel would henceforth have a separate pay commission, which is delinked from the civilian pay panel.
In a communication to the Defence Ministry the PMO also granted the demand for placing 12,000 odd Lieutenant Colonels and equivalents in Navy and Air Force in the pay band four of the sixth central pay commission.However, the PMO, which considered the recommendations of the ministerial committee headed by External Affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee, said that the pay band four status with a grade pay of Rs 8000 would be accorded to Lieutenant Colonels who were performing a combat role or were ready for combat.
Those Lieutenant Colonels on deputation to other services would receive the pay band four status only when they return to their parent service.Another demand accepted by the PMO concerned the jawans, for whom the government would restore the 70 per cent pensionary weightage.Till the government implements the sixth pay commission’s recommendations for allowing retired armed forces personnel’s lateral entry into paramilitary and central police forces, the 70 per cent weightage would continue.
The present PMO communication, sent to the Defence Ministry in the last week of December, however, is silent on the two other core demands of the armed forces: placing the Lieutenant Generals in the higher administrative grade plus pay scales and bringing grade pay of officers from Captains to Brigadiers on par with their civilian counterparts.
But, conceding to the Defence personnel’s demand the PMO said it would set up a high powered committee to review the command and control functions, and the status of the armed forces vis-a-vis that of their civilian and paramilitary counterparts.
Though Defence Ministry assumed that the PMO’s communication is a fiat to the armed forces, the nitty gritty of implementing them would have to be worked out in concert with the services headquarters, officials said.After the Cabinet decided in August to implement the sixth pay commission from September last year, the armed forces had raised the “anomalies” and sought a political decision on it.
At one point, the services headquarters had in an unprecedented move refused to implement the cabinet decision, causing a lot of embarrassment to the government. The services chief had time and again stated that the pay commission “anomalies” were not about money but about status and command and control issues. Consequently, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh intervened and set up the ministerial committee which had Defence Minister AK Antony and Home Minister P Chidambaram as members.The committee had submitted its report to the PM in the middle of December 2008.
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