It was an occasion for the cricket fraternity in the city to celebrate and so they did in style. Mylapore resident V. V. Kumar turned 90 on June 22 and his teammates got together to host a party for the legendary leg spinner at the Madras Cricket Club.
Present were many of Kumar’s teammates over the years.
Actually four of them – V. Krishnaswamy, P. Mukund, A G. Satvinder Singh and P. R. Ramakrishnan – were of the view that the landmark birthday should be celebrated in a befitting manner and with the help of veteran sports writer Partab Ramchand, brought out a commemorative book on the occasion.
The book, which has been circulating fast and far now, has pieces by a number of cricketers writing about their experiences with Kumar touching on not only his ethereal skills as a bowler but also his playful and helping nature, complete with amusing anecdotes.
At the party, journalist N. Ram and former India cricketer C. D. Gopinath spoke. Gopinath released the first copy of the book ‘Celebrating VV Kumar @ 90’ while Satvinder Singh presented a memento to Kumar who also cut a huge cake to mark the occasion.
Kumar played just two Test matches in the early 60s but was a stalwart for Tamil Nadu in the Ranji trophy for over 20 years. He was the first bowler to take 300 wickets and 400 wickets in the premier national competition and finished with 418 wickets. In first class cricket, Kumar had a tally of 599 wickets.
