Women’s cricket in India needs a visionary, says Mamatha Maben

Maben was speaking at a panel discussion during the launch of The Fire Burns Blue – A History of Women’s Cricket in India, co-authored by Karunya Keshav and Sidhanta Patnaik for Westland Publications, in Bangalore on Wednesday (December 19). Pramila Bhat, who led India to their first World Cup semifinal in 1997, was the other panelist, and the discussion was moderated by Suresh Menon, the veteran sports journalist, author and columnist.

India’s final appearance in the 2017 World Cup created large interest for the women’s game across the country, but BCCI did not capitalise on it in a way it should have. The tournament, where India missed out on lifting their first global title by nine runs, got over in July, but there was no international assignment after that till the tour of South Africa in February this year where most of the matches were not televised.

After that India returned home to play three One-Day Internationals against Australia in front of jampacked crowd in Baroda, but the triangular Twenty20 International series, with England being the third team, was played out in front of empty stands in Mumbai at 10am in the morning.

“Though BCCI is doing so much, women’s cricket can be marketed much better. I thought immediately after the World Cup last year it was such a huge platform,” Maben said. “You cannot imagine the kind of boost women’s cricket got not only in India, but worldwide. But after that it was such a lull and things just didn’t take off. Was there no will? We could not put two and two together. Eventually when we had the T20I series it was in the morning, and that too in Mumbai. We are doing it, but we could have done much more.

“Again everyone came together during the World T20 this year. Why wait for such occasions. BCCI has no dearth of funds. During Women’s Cricket Association of India days, we used to understand that they don’t have money and whatever little money is there it won’t be possible for them to give us because they are surviving on that. But now that’s not the case. They can allocate some funds,” she added. “We need a visionary. If we can have a visionary at the helm and say women’s cricket is your baby and you develop it over five years then you take a couple of steps forward. The mistake we are doing is we are comparing everything to men’s cricket. They are somewhere else. Where we are, from there take us five feet up. That much only we are asking. For that we need a visionary.

“Immediately after the World Cup, there was a spur in the number of girl students in private academies. Small girls – five-seven year old,” she continued. “This is where the administration should have cashed in, they should have started inter-schools cricket because there is passion which needed to be tapped. But there is no avenue for it to be displayed.”

With BCCI introducing central contracts in 2015 and the ICC Women’s ODI Championship where each team is guaranteed of 21 matches against the other seven top-ranked sides in a window of three years, Maben felt the game at the highest level has come a long way since her time. She, however, was clear that the real work has to happen at the grassroots level to make the country’s cricketing structure robust.

“When the cream (of India’s talent is concerned) they are always playing either international or domestic matches, but there is still a lot to be done at the domestic level,” Maben pointed out. “Our Karnataka state girls practice very hard through the year, but get to play eight 50-over matches in a year and a few more if they qualify (for the knockouts). The cream has no issues, but what about others? There has to be more investment there and in the long term it is going to pay back.”

Maben also insisted that the time was right to start the Women’s Indian Premier League along the lines of Australia’s Women’s Big Bash League and England’s Kia Super League. “I definitely think it is time for Women’s IPL. The kind of power hitting that is going on around the world. They are able to play a fast-paced game. 160 is now an easy total. If Australia and England can do it, why cannot India do it?”

There have been many points through the history of women’s cricket in India where things have fizzled out after looking promising. The Centenary Cup tri-series win in 1995 where India beat hosts New Zealand and Australia under the captaincy of Purnima Rau was one such occasion. It was India’s first major triumph.

“We had a major breakthrough in 1995 when we won in New Zealand. That should have been the turning point in women’s cricket, but it never happened. Even after BCCI took over in 2006 we lost out ten years. It’s only after last year World Cup when everybody suddenly woke up and said women can play cricket, especially after Harmanpreet’s (171 not out against Australia in the semifinal) knock,” said Bhat. “I have been living in UAE for last 20 years and nobody knew, but after the women’s World Cup, Smitha (Harikrishna) and me were everywhere on radio and print. Everyone was asking us, where were you hiding in the UAE for so long.”

Both Maben and Bhat agreed that social media has played a big role in the rise of women’s cricket in India as more stories are coming forward. Karunya said that the urge to connect with others outside the obvious names formed the foundation of the book.

“We have been covering women’s cricket for a while now, and as journalists every time we had to quote someone it was always the known names like Shantha Rangaswamy, Diana Edulji or Mithali Raj,” said Karunya. “All of them were articulate, but when we were planning for our coverage for the 2017 World Cup (at Wisden India), we realised that we need to expand our understanding of the game and for that we need to reach out to other people who have been a part of this journey. The more we spoke to people, the more we realised that everyone had a story to tell.”

Menon said the work of Karunya and Patnaik is “the finest book on history of cricket written in India either men or women.”

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