The Hindu : An enduring love affair with sports

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Saturday, Sep 13, 2003

Sports

Sports

An enduring love affair with sports

By S. Thyagarajan

Prize giving function of the inaugural Sport & Pastime trophy cricket tournment (now The Hindu trophy) in 1951. L to R: G. Narasimhan, V. R. Lakshmi Ratan, C. R. Pattabhiraman, K. Srinivasan, M. A. Muthiah Chettiar, V. Pattabhiraman and G. Kasturi.

APART from being the pioneer in designing and developing the concept of the sports page, The Hindu also played a consistent and committed role as a promoter of sports, long before the theme of sponsorship acquired its present-day dynamics.

The initiative towards devoting a separate section to sport in the daily newspaper came from the then publisher, Kasturi Gopalan, "the father of the sports page," as Rangaswamy Parthasarathy noted in "A Hundred Years of The Hindu." Lending a helping hand to Kasturi Gopalan, a fine hockey and tennis player in his college days, was the first sportswriter of this paper, Murugesa Mudaliar.

The dawn of independence and the prevailing euphoria afforded increased scope for The Hindu to play a significant part in sports promotion. Sport & Pastime, the brain-child of G. Kasturi, who later took over the reins as the Editor of The Hindu, was launched and it was a perfect vehicle to reflect the hopes and aspirations of the youth. Probably the first sport to come into The Hindu's sponsorship fold was hockey in 1951. India was the world power at that point, having taken all the four Olympic gold medals between 1928 and 1948.

When the National championship came to Madras for the first time, the startling fact that the event was being played without a trophy came to the notice of the then Editor, Kasturi Srinivasan. The Maori Shield — a memento from the New Zealand Hockey Association when India toured that country in 1935 — was being given as the trophy for the winner. But in the chaos of partition the trophy was lost.

Kasturi Srinivasan offered a magnificent silver trophy, appropriately named to serve the memory of one of the paper's finest editors, S. Rangaswami, a splendid hockey player. "Happily, the proprietors of The Hindu and Sport & Pastime, great lovers of sport, presented the new trophy, the handsome Rangaswami Cup," wrote Dhyan Chand in his autobiography, Goal. At Chepauk, where the National was held, Kasturi Srinivasan gave away the trophy after the final.

To channelise the growing interest for cricket, an innovative 30-overs-a-side tournament was put on boards for the Sport & Pastime Trophy in the 1950-51 season. Hailed as the trendsetter to the now popular one-day internationals, the Sport & Pastime Trophy tournament was modelled on the Saturday afternoon matches in England.

The idea to float such an event to open up avenues of employment for players in the corporate sector was put across by V. R. Lakshmi Ratan, then Secretary of the Madras Cricket Association, to Kasturi Srinivasan, who readily agreed.

Instant cricket was an instant success. Year after year the number of entries burgeoned and ultimately over a 100 institutions in the industry and banking sectors began to field teams. The final matches on the Marina Ground (Presidency College) attracted huge crowds. Even when the Sport & Pastime magazine was suspended in 1968, the event continued. The competition was re-named The Hindu Trophy tournament and the Golden Jubilee of the event was celebrated this year with the current Editor-in Chief, N. Ram, as the chief guest.

When the current Printer and Publisher of The Hindu, S. Rangarajan, a shrewd captain and a technically well equipped batsman, jointly sponsored Jolly Rovers Cricket Club in the first division along with K. Balakrishna Rao of the Dasaprakash Hotel group in the 1960s a few State level cricketers were also inducted as staff in the editorial department. P. K. Belliappa and V. Rajaram were among the notable players.

The outstanding success of The Hindu trophy tournament paved the way for the event to be staged in centres such as Bangalore, Hyderabad and Vizag. For the last 17 years, The Hindu is hosting The Sportstar trophy competition for juniors in Mumbai.

Interestingly, Sachin Tendulkar became the Player of the Tournament in 1987, two years before he won his spurs as a Test cricketer. Another player of note to emerge from this tournament is Ajit Agarkar.

Tennis always enjoyed a high profile status in The Hindu. G. Kasturi headed the State Association for two years from 1962, and the present Joint Managing Director, N. Murali, was at the helm of the TNTA from 1994 to 1996. The Hindu is also the media partner for the Chennai-ATP championship since 1997.

Patronage for golf, billiards and snooker too has been significant. The late G. Narasimhan, General Manager, was a father figure to many aspiring golfers at the Cosmopolitan links. When the popularity of the sport began to soar, The Hindu quickly stepped into sponsoring golf in a big way.

G. Narasimhan was also the sheet anchor of the billiards and snooker administration in the State for a number of years. A two day amateur event is also sponsored by The Sportstar. Every player of the green baize at that time owed a debt of gratitude to G. Narasimhan for the help and support he rendered for players' welfare. It would be wrong to conclude that The Hindu sponsored only glamour sports. Chess and aquatics received equal preference. In fact, the Kasturi Reserve and Kasturi Open — first put on boards in 1942 and revived in 1958 — were two important tournaments, long before chess became a mass sport that it is now.

Aquatics at the state level received due recognition thanks to the attention paid towards this end by N. Ravi , Editor, who headed the State Association for about a decade.

No survey of The Hindu's role in sports is complete without mention of the support extended to horse racing. In recent years, The Hindu has sponsored some prestigious races at Chennai, Bangalore, Hyderabad and Mumbai.

As The Hindu steps into its 126th year, its commitment to sport remains strong as ever.

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