Wasim Akram
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Highlights of his life
January 8, 2023: The Times of India
With the Bangalore Test (the fifth and final Test of the Pakistani tour in 1987), and the nations, so delicately balanced, you might have expected some tension between the teams, both of whom were staying at the Taj. In fact, the atmosphere was festive. Rest day fell during Holi, which we Pakistanis had only seen in Bollywood movies, but in which we joined with enthusiasm. We threw so much colour at each other that it was still staining the water when I was washing my hair months later. When Maninder (Singh) and Ejaz (Ahmed) helped me tip Ravi (Shastri) from his sun lounge into the pool, the water went first blue then black.
Imran (Khan) locked himself in his room, so Sunny (Gavaskar) sent a girl up to knock, knowing Imran could not resist opening the door; when he did, we poured in, throwing colour everywhere. Later we were lazing by the pool when Javed (Miandad) came running past, followed by (Abdul) Qadir brandishing a knife — a small knife but still a knife. Who knows what that was about?. . . In this day and age, when politicians have rendered cricket relations between India and Pakistan all but impossible, such fraternity must be hard to believe. But as far as the players were concerned, ‘Cricket for Peace’ was more than an empty slogan.
VIV WANTED TO KILL ME
I enjoyed my rivalry with Viv (Richards). He had the broadest shoulders, the biggest swagger. Nobody occupied the crease like him. Nobody chewed gum like him — it was like he was chomping down on you. Still, maybe he was just a little past his peak, and that cap was an invitation to bounce him. In the third Test at Bridgetown, Barbados, I had him caught at fine leg by Mudassar (Nazar) in the first innings, then threw myself into bowling the penultimate over of the fourth day in West Indies’s second innings, knocking his cap off and following through with a ‘F* off’ for good measure. Suddenly Viv seemed to swell in size. ‘Don’t swear at me, man,’ he rumbled. ‘Or I’ll kill you. ’ I did not know Viv well at this stage, but I knew him well enough to understand that he was not a man to say anything lightly. ‘What do I do with Viv?’ I asked Imran anxiously as I walked back. ‘He said he’s going to kill me. ’ ‘Don’t worry,’ said Imran. ‘I am with you. Give him another. ’ So I did, and a few more for good measure, amid lots of mutual snarling, before stumps were drawn.
I was sitting in the dressing room afterwards, when the attendant rushed up to me. ‘Someone wants to see you outside,’ he said gravely. The great man’s bare torso was glistening with sweat; he held a bat on his shoulder, wore a snarl on his face. Not waiting for him to open his mouth, I ducked back into the dressing room to where Imran was sitting. ‘It’s Viv,’ I said anxiously. ‘He was serious. He wants to kill me. ’ A smile crossed my captain’s face. ‘It’s your fight,’ he said. ‘You sort it out. ’
FACING FIXING ALLEGATIONS
Having realised it could not simply ban players on suspicion of match fixing, the PCB had set investigations in train. Returning to Lahore, I learnt that a ‘fact-finding’ committee chaired by Justice Choudhury Ejaz Yousuf had collected another bunch of untested allegations from half-a-dozen current players, the most significant of which for me was an affidavit from Ata-ur-Rehman claiming I had offered him ‘a purse of Rs 3-4 lakh for doing a favour’ — viz ‘to bowl badly’ in the last match of that 1994 ODI series in New Zealand, in line with ‘arrangements’ made by Saleem Malik and Ejaz Ahmed. There was no proof of this, only his word. Nobody pointed out that Ejaz was not actually on that tour. Nobody thought it strange that Ata-ur-Rehman had waited more than four years to share this knowledge, and had played many games alongside me without protest. Yousuf recommended that Saleem, Ejaz and myself be ‘kept away from the Pakistan team’ pending a fully fledged commission of inquiry.
Much of this period, I must confess, is a blank. It is like a trauma I have completely repressed. Only recently have I had the nerve to revisit it. . . I went to see my father. While I visited, I asked Ahsan (Chishty, a friend) to stay in the car. Twenty minutes later, I came out, got in the passenger’s seat, and sat staring ahead. ‘What did he say?’ asked Ahsan. ‘He gave me the name of a solicitor,’ I replied. Then I exploded: ‘How many people do I have to tell I’ve done nothing? How many?!’ When even your father is wondering, you feel truly alone. At last I did get some effective help. My English lawyer Naynesh Desai chased down Ata-ur-Rehman, by now in Newcastle and engaged to an English woman: Ata admitted that he had been cajoled into providing the affidavit by Aamir Sohail. Would he be prepared to swear to that? Yes, he told Naynesh, on two conditions: that he be provided with a return air fare to London, and a shawarma from Edgware Road. Naynesh gladly obliged.
Ata duly came in, dictated the story, enjoyed his shawarma while the statement was typed up, then went through it line by line with his fiancée until he was happy.
…In the dark-pink brick buildings of Lahore’s High Court …I sat mostly on my own while the rest of the team gathered on the other side. It was like I was contagious or radioactive. Periodically, someone in the court would come up and ask for an autograph. Then, as I drove home, people would throw themselves at my car and hold evening paper headlines up against my windscreen. The stress was intense, and it exacerbated my diabetes as well as my depression.
Edited excerpts from ‘Sultan: A Memoir’ by Wasim Akram with Gideon Haigh published by HarperCollins India
