Cricketers gave politicians a tough fight: Sandhu

Cricketers ensured it wasn't a cakewalk for seasoned campaigners in MCA polls, says Balwinder Sandhu

The cricketers may have failed to woo voters in Friday's Mumbai Cricket Association (MCA) polls, but they were glad to put up a fight against political heavyweight Vilasrao Deshmukh. The former chief minister of Maharashtra, Deshmukh, who was supported by NCP chief Sharad Pawar, pipped former India captain Dilip Vengsarkar by 47 votes for the president's post.


Balwinder Sandhu

Former Mumbai captain Milind Rege was beaten fair and square by Prof Ratnakar Shetty and Vijay Patil for the vice-president's post while former India pacers Karsan Ghavri and Balwinder Singh Sandhu failed to win a place in the Managing Committee.

Former India cricketer and coach Lalchand Rajput, who contested as independent candidate, too failed to win either of the two spots for Joint Secretaries. Chandrakant Pandit was the only cricketer who managed to win a place amongst the 11 members in the Managing Committee.

Sandhu, however, feels they made the politicians and several seasoned campaigners fight hard to garner votes. "For these politicians and seasoned campaigners, it would have been easy to take 329 voters into confidence. It is peanuts for politicians who have won state and national elections several times.

"At least we have made them work hard this time. We ensured that it is not a cakewalk. We gave them a tough fight. The margin of difference is also not very much. There are definitely lot of positives to come out for us," Sandhu told SUNDAY MiD DAY.

The former Mumbai coach said the battle was lost because they planned everything like cricketers and not like politicians. "We are novice to all this as compared to the opposition. We prepared for the elections in the same way as we did for a cricket match. Cricketers cannot think like politicians and vice-versa.

"Contesting elections is not my forte. I am a coach. I only think of developing the game and its cricketers. Politics is not my cup of tea. I contested because Dilip wanted my support. My heart goes out to him. He had ambitious plans," said the 1983 World Cup-winning member before adding, "It was a game, which we lost. I wish all the best to the candidates who are elected.

"There are some very good administrators like Prof Shetty, Patil, Nitin Dalal, Dr PV Shetty and cricketer Chandrakant Pandit among the elected people." Sandhu was grateful to the 116 voters who voted for him. "For first-timers to get one-third of votes is not bad. I am glad that these people didn't bow to any pressure and believed in me. Overall, I think we were quite successful," he concluded.