An unusual sight could be witnessed at the Tlangnuam football field on a sunny afternoon in Aizawl while the midday heat was soaring high. A game of cricket was being played by a group of girls competing in a junior T20 tournament.
Cricket and Mizoram are rarely, if ever, mentioned in the same sentence. Football clearly remains the most favourite spectator sport here and in Lalremsiami, the state has also found a potential hockey icon.
But even locals may struggle to name Mizoram cricketers.
That said, it isn’t as if it is an alien sport for the locals. While cricket has been played by the people of Mizoram since the 1970s, the sport’s popularity has grown in small waves compared to the more popular games like basketball and football. However, cricket players here are determined to swing their bats through the dusty fields of Mizoram.
“I have played the game since I was around sixteen years old,” Lalhmangaihsangi, said one of the cricketers at the Tlangnuam field. Lalhmangaihsangi was the captain of one of the two teams that were playing at the local field. She also plays in the Mizoram Under 19 Women’s team.
“My friends had suggested that I should start playing cricket as I am into sports. Some people came to select players for the Mizoram team so I tried and got in. Though I did not know much about the game, I had qualified for the team as there were insufficient players and I started learning the game after joining,” she said.
She believes cricket has a bright future in Mizoram, “Right now, I think cricket is the best option in the field of sports in Mizoram. At the Mizoram level, other games such as football and basketball do not have much money movement, but cricket is quite hopeful even financially.”
The other girls playing on the field also had high dreams and aspirations. An eighth grader, Nancy Lalthlamuanpuii wants to play for Team India one day. She said, “I only started playing recently, it has not even been a year. I watched a lot of women’s cricket on TV and started having an interest in it. I play for around three hours a day sometimes. I want to play in the under-19 team and want to become one of the best players in the India team.”
For a Mizo player to become the best in the country, they might have to make a little more effort than cricketers from other parts of India, considering the poor infrastructure available in the state and the delayed affiliation to BCCI.
Decades of anonymity and false promises
BCCI Apex Council member, Mamom Majumdar, one of the pioneers of cricket in Mizoram, said “Born and brought up in Mizoram, to be very honest it was a struggle but we did not surrender. I got support from my fellow committee members. We never got the affiliation. The other five Northeast states were associate members but Mizoram did not get associate membership. I tried, I met everybody: Arun Jaitley, Sharun Pawar…we formed the Cricket Association of Mizoram in 1992. I was the assistant secretary. From then on, we tried to get an affiliation to the BCCI but due to this we could not get it. After a long wait, they came for an inspection and we still did not get it. But towards the end of 2017, because of the Lodha committee recommendation, we got it. Now, I am also in the BCCI/ The current BCCI regime, especially secretary Jay Shah, is very helpful to Northeast states. He wants to develop the NE and I am working closely with him.”
The Lodha Committee was appointed by the Supreme Court of India on 23 January 2015 to analyse and recommend implementable actions for improving the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).
A tough start, but lessons learnt
Ever since its inception, the Cricket Association of Mizoram had regularly applied for a BCCI membership but could not get approved. It was the last state among all Northeast states to have an association with the BCCI. In 2018, when the Mizoram team made its debut and was named as one of the teams that would compete in the Ranji trophy, the Telangana Cricket Association questioned their inclusion, saying “There should be a few cricketing parameters as qualification criteria that would help increase the competence and considerable standard for any regional team to play first-class cricket.”
It was the first time the Mizoram cricket team played a first-division league in a two-day format and they were met with heavy losses.
Due to the delayed affiliation, there is little to mention of cricket infrastructure in Mizoram despite there being sixteen cricket clubs directly under the CAM with regular tournaments and fixtures throughout the year. During the monsoon season, the players have nowhere to practise and the unpredictable rain in the state does little to help. To ease the situation, cricket teams are sent to other states during the monsoon season.
First step? Infrastructure
“During the off-season, we have a lot of rain here. We don’t have practice facilities but we need to provide facilities to the players so we send the team outside to attend camps in states where they have better facilities. For the last three years, we have been doing that. This year also we will continue doing that but once our indoor cricket centre is constructed in Sihhmui, this problem can be solved. The tender is approved and we are waiting for the BCCI secretary to come and lay the foundation stone and the construction will start. If we can train the team here, we can save the money incurred on training them in other states. It has been a hard struggle for Mizoram. After getting affiliation from the BCCI we are progressing, we are improving but we don’t have the infrastructure so now this BCCI is helping us in getting a building infrastructure. An indoor cricket facility with a swimming pool is coming up in Suaka cricket ground which is directly funded by the BCCI. We have made concrete pitches within the city in many places so that the players can practise and we have given the districts also so that players are able to practise,” said Majumdar.
Ruatsanga, a coach affiliated with the Cricket Association of Mizoram also shared the problems the teams face during the monsoon season, saying, “We were only affiliated in 2018 so while we see ourselves to have achieved progress, it will take time for us to gain a foothold as strong as other sport disciplines like football. It is a seasonal game, especially in the Northeast and here in Mizoram during monsoon, we cannot play as there is heavy rainfall for long periods. We have one indoor stadium in Ramhlun and all of us are sharing it. The state teams practise there but it is hard for individuals or clubs to get a chance to practise. Anytime it rains we cannot play, We have to cancel the match because the ground is too muddy.”
Despite the poor infrastructure facilities, the spirit of cricket aficionados in Mizoram is not deterred. Take for example, Malsawma Rivung from Lunglei district who started playing cricket at the young age of ten. “I started playing cricket at the age of 10, I was introduced to the game by a Nepali family who lived next door. We played on the pavement with tennis balls and a wooden plank. We played there for a few months until our parents forced us to a bigger playground after they’d had enough broken windows. The year was 1998 and Sachin Tendulkar was at his peak, we absolutely adored him and he’s one reason we fell in love with the game,” he said.
“Cricket Association of Mizoram (CAM) and BCCI have done quite well to promote cricket over the past few years. I’m not aware of anything the government has done to promote cricket in the state apart from the recent MOU between the education department and CAM. In the late 90s and early 20s, cricket was gaining popularity in the state, but back then the CAM neither had the backing of the government nor the BCCI. Now that CAM has the backing of the BCCI I hope to see growth, especially in the remote villages and towns. There are far too many larger villages and towns where cricket is not yet introduced. I think cricket in Mizoram will grow exponentially in the next few years. We have a good team of administrators at the state level and new district associations are being formed too. The game already has very strong roots in Aizawl, the administration now needs to turn its eyes to the smaller towns,” he added.
To stress the need to branch out to smaller towns, Rivung explained how just a month ago, a woman had travelled with her 15-year-old son from a village four hours away to Lunglei because he wanted to play cricket and they were looking for someone who plays the sport. The mother-son duo chanced upon Rivung and his friends playing in a field and approached them.
Explaining why cricket is suited well for the Mizo physique, Rivung said, “The most successful spinners and batsmen like Sachin Tendulkar, Brian Lara, Shane Warne etc aren’t very tall. They are about the average Mizo. So in terms of height and stature, we Mizos aren’t at a disadvantage in cricket, unlike other sports like basketball. In terms of financial benefits, we are aware of the riches this game can give especially in India. Playing even at the state level is enough to earn you a good livelihood. But all aspiring cricketers don’t become professionals, even then the life lessons, friendships and camaraderie stay with you for a lifetime.”
Like Rivung, Majumdar has high hopes for cricket in Mizoram and believes it is the next best thing for the state, “The happiest part now I see looking at the players my boys, they are playing in the BCCI platform, they are getting a good salary, the team the coaches we can pay salary we can give financial assistance to the members. It is a relief. There is satisfaction. All that hard work we had done I am satisfied it was worth it. A lot of improvement is there, football has been the main game here. But the way we are seeing it, parents are showing interest in cricket and many children are coming to Aizawl city and in the districts also players are coming. If you ask me I will say the next best thing in Mizoram is cricket.”
Source: neweekly.in
