The Dhoni Touch

by Bharat Sundaresan

  ‘I had just returned from one of my Jalandhar visits. BAS had launched a new wheel-wala kitbag. I went to collect it from a friend’s place which was near Sarkar’s house. Mahi’s selection for East Zone had only appeared in the Bengali paper that Sarkar’s father would get at home. As soon as I entered, his father said, “Mahi knows he’s been picked to go to Agartala, right?” I said, “No, uncle, he doesn’t!”’ The last train to Kolkata had already left. Panic calls to the Bihar Cricket Association (BCA) and the CCL didn’t yield much, and Chhotu decided to hire a Tata Sumo that very night and leave for Kolkata with Dhoni and Gautam Gupta—who would later on become Dhoni’s brother-in-law after marrying his elder sister, Jayanti—for company. The car broke down during the middle of the night causing a three-hour delay, and to make matters worse, they were delayed an extra hour after being stopped by the state police for checking. That last delay meant that they couldn’t make it on time for the flight. Dhoni eventually had to take a flight later in the day, which allowed Deep Dasgupta to don the gloves. Dhoni spent the match on the bench. Dasgupta managed scores of 0 and 32 not out against a power-packed South Zone attack, which included Javagal Srinath, Venkatesh Prasad and Sunil Joshi—all India regulars at that point. This was January 2001, and there are those who believe that missing the flight to Agartala delayed Dhoni’s entry into international cricket by a few years, allowing Dasgupta to pip him to the post. At that stage of his career, Dhoni had appeared in nine first-class matches and had an average of 34.14. We can never say for sure how he would have fared against the likes of Srinath and Prasad at that nascent stage of his career, and the impact it would have left on him. The fact that he seemed so primed for international cricket when he did make it nearly four years later, proves that the timing of his entry too was just perfect. Maybe 2001 wasn’t meant to be his time for a reason. Dasgupta did keep his place despite his failures against South Zone to face West Zone, which again had an attack comprising Ajit Agarkar and Zaheer Khan. He made scores of 2 and 0 while Dhoni watched from the sidelines—elated, as many of his friends say, to just share the same field as his idol Sachin Tendulkar.

  ‘Uss raat hamara banda sahi jagah pahunch nahi paaya, lekin aakhir mein sahi jagah pahunch hi gaya life mein. (That night, our man was not able to reach the right place; but eventually, he did reach the right place in life.)’ Chhotu-bhaiya couldn’t have put it better.

  Chhotu also recalls having experienced an epiphanic moment of Nostradamus proportions during a school league match at the Ranchi College ground. He had two friends for company, though he isn’t sure whether they felt the same way he did. It wasn’t a blazing knock or even one of those trademark Dhoni bludgeons that convinced Chhotu that his pillion rider was made for greatness. It was Dhoni the wicketkeeper that prompted the prediction.

  ‘It was a catch down the leg-side he took off a fast bowler. It was a great catch, where he moved quickly and took it despite being blind-sided. Mere dil se tabhi nikla ki yeh ek din India ke liye khelega. (It came from my heart then that this guy would play for India one day.) My friends were taken aback. And then I remember him taking a similar catch during the last World Cup, and I was like, yeh toh hum dekhe the aur bole bhi the (I had seen this before, and spoken about it),’ Chhotu says with a sense of great pride.

  The India A tour to Kenya in 2004 is correctly identified as the tipping point for Dhoni’s graduation to international cricket. This was one of the first A series to be shown live on TV back home. It couldn’t have been timelier. At that point, fringe players didn’t quite get the same number of A tours to show off their skills as they do now. ‘A’ tour performances were what you heard about and bothered to read about if you were a scrupulously keen follower of the game. And so, India got to witness Dhoni’s unique repertoire of breathtaking strokes rather than just read about his two centuries in the scorecard a day later. It also helped Chhotu start a tradition of his own. He started taping all of Dhoni’s exploits using a VCR on one of those ‘big cassettes’, as he puts it. He did it on the same small-screen TV that he still claims to keep in his shop. ‘But wait, the TV is still here?’ I ask.

  And that sets me up for the big reveal. I picture it being part of Chhotu-bhaiya’s usual routine, where he coaxes his audience into a discussion about Dhoni’s India A blitzes and then springs on them the TV trick. He’s still laughing as he begins moving a few cartons in front of the counter before pushing back his own tiny desk and opening a shelf, which faces inward and away from the road, making it completely hidden from view. I wonder whether it always requires such elaborate shifting or it’s just part of the show. The drama is totally worth it. He even has to move some of the apparel—a few T-shirts and a couple of shorts—for the 12-inch TV to be finally revealed. So clandestine is the location that Q of James Bond fame might be proud of it.

  ‘I don’t like going to the ground to watch games. I prefer it right here on this old TV. But I always watch it on mute. And because of its location, nobody outside can ever make out I’m watching TV and that too a cricket match,’ he says.

  Chhotu remembers having asked Dhoni for two gifts from Kenya—two centuries, preferably against Pakistan, which is exactly what his friend got him. In return, Chhotu played the perfect elder sibling, recording the entire innings and then taking TV grabs and sticking them up for display all around his enterprise.

  While describing some of Dhoni’s shots from those knocks, Chhotu gets up and cleans the photos with a cloth and a lot of care. It’s something that he has to do often, considering the proximity to the bustling and dusty Sujata Chowk. He also has thousands of newspaper clippings dating back from 1995–96. ‘You’re the real Dhoni chronicler,’ I tell him. Chhotu smiles.

  Dhoni had crossed single figures only once in his first three ODI innings. So, when India met Pakistan in the second ODI in Vizag on 5 April 2005, India’s new wicketkeeper had a lot to prove. Dhoni had batted at No. 7 in all those previous innings. That morning, Chhotu paid a visit to his gurudwara.

  ‘I prayed, “Babaji, aaj iska test hai. (Babaji, today he has a test.)” If Mahi comes up the order today, he’ll make it count. When Chottu came back to the shop and switched on his trusted TV, Sachin Tendulkar was walking back, run out for just 2. And in walked Dhoni. His first scoring shot was a punch-drive on the up off Mohammad Sami that went between bowler and mid-off for four. It’s an area of the ground where he rarely scores. But it was a shot that had both oomph and a touch of arrogance.

  ‘I saw that boundary and thought, today he’ll score a century. His career hasn’t looked back since that boundary,’ recalls Chhotu about the 123-ball 148 that set the Dhoni career off with a bang.

  It only got better a day later as Dhoni returned to great fanfare in his home town and celebrated what would be the first of many epoch-defining feats with his core group of Chittu, Chhotu and Gautam-da over dinner at their favourite dhaba. Yes, the ‘dhabhe mein khane wala’ had made it big but not forgotten his roots.

  Chhotu and Greg Chappell share something in common. They both predicted that Dhoni would become Indian captain long before anyone even imagined him as a candidate or even thought of it as a probability. While Chappell would famously declare this during a selection meeting, Chhotu would shock those around him with the same claim. But somehow, and here’s where the protectiveness of being a bhaiya kicks in, Chhotu says he was suspicious of the motives behind naming Dhoni as the Indian captain for the inaugural World T20. This is a common thread you see with the Ranchi folk, a prevailing sense of suspicion over a lot of decisions taken around their friend and idol. It’s perhaps a small-town thing, this near-paranoia, but in Dhoni’s context, their distrust is just another extension of their genuine concern for him.

  ‘A lot of people were after him. They made him captain within two years for a reason. There’s a conspiracy behind it, we thought then. T20 was considered a random format back then, and they thought, make him captain, he won’t do well and we can get rid of him from the team itself,’
Chhotu spells out the conspiracy. Not that it affected his confidence about Dhoni overcoming even this unlikely challenge.

  ‘I knew he would do well and win the World T20. Those who dig a hole for others, fall into it themselves. That fact will always remain—he has never done bad things to anyone. He kept doing his thing and continued to give it his best, even today,’ he adds.

  The World T20 victory changed Dhoni’s profile around India, and especially in Ranchi. He could no longer make visits to Prime Sports without the entire road being cordoned off. And with time, he and Chhotu-bhaiya began to drift apart, only physically though, as I’m told repeatedly.

  Chhotu recalls having given a young Dhoni only one piece of cricketing advice. ‘Stay at the crease, and the runs will always come to you.’ I bring up the subject of the elder-brother role that he has been playing in Dhoni’s life, and Chhotu sheepishly tells me, ‘By the time I could give him any life advice: he’d grown too big for me, in stature anyway.’ The common perception about Dhoni in many circles is that he doesn’t let anyone get too close to him. Chhotu disagrees. ‘Whoever is with him, is with him for life.’

  Funnily enough, these days Dhoni plays bhaiya to Chhotu’s eleven-year-old son, Simar Singh. But before we get to that, I am shown a video of young Simar batting on a local ground. ‘The feet are moving well,’ I observe. Pat comes the reply from the father: ‘Haath nahi theek aa raha hai. (The hands are not moving correctly.) It’s been four months now.’

  When the Singhs do visit the Dhoni household, cricket, as always, is off the menu. Simar though is allowed a few indulgences.

  ‘He goes there and plays cards with Mahi and his wife,’ Chhotu says. ‘Badi kum umar mein sikha diya hai aapne usse? (Haven’t you taught him to play cards at too young an age?),’ I say, and he replies, ‘Sir, he’s not only learnt it on his own, he’s also taught Mahi and Sakshi those card games.’

  Cricket rarely features in conversations involving Chittu, Chhotu and Mahi. That’s been the case right from the school days, both his closest confidants admit. There are enough common interests otherwise to keep them distracted from bats and balls. I am repeatedly subjected to one of them during my visit to Prime Sports. As we are talking, Chhotu-bhaiya has sent his apprentice on a number of occasions to get chai. At times, the tea is accompanied by biscuits and pastries.

  ‘Whenever the three of us are together, there’ll be lots of chai and lots of comedy. Before he became a star, we never talked cricket. Now he’s a superstar and we still don’t talk cricket. Woh khel raha hai, aur hum hamara kaam kar rahe hai. (He’s playing, and we are doing our own thing.) It’s a simple equation,’ says Chhotu. He too then brings up the McDowell’s No. 1 Soda ad featuring him and Chittu, though not as gushingly as his partner-in-crime, and mentions the chai scene in it. This is about Dhoni complaining about Chittu’s sugarless tea, and how he himself makes the best chai among all the three.

  This has been a running gag among them for years now. Chittu had insisted that Dhoni’s simplicity came through in the ad too while he speaks about sipping ‘Chittu’s kharaab (bad) chai’. ‘Even when you give him a cup of tea, if there’s slightly less sugar, he’ll drink it, but once he’s done, he’ll say, “Thodi cheeni kum tha. Pehle nahi bolega, last mein bolega. (The sugar was less. He won’t say it at first, but only at the end.),”’ Chittu had said.

  Like with Chittu, Chhotu-bhaiya too understands his role very clearly in the Dhoni journey, and how it’s changed with time despite their relationship remaining the same. This is the main reason they’ve managed to stay so close to this complex enigma in a simple avatar. And one of Dhoni’s characteristics they both harp on is that he never forgets those who have helped him.

  ‘But at the same time, we never expected anything in return. We realized that we were just playing our roles in this special journey. None of us who have remained close to him did it with any other intention. It was always unconditional. All I did was introduce him to BAS. They helped him. Yeh aage pahunch gaya. Company ka bhi achcha ho gaya. MS ka bhi achcha ho gaya. Aur hamara bhi achcha ho gaya. (He went ahead. The company benefitted. MS benefitted. And we too benefitted.),’ Chhotu quips.

  He then thinks back to those multiple bike rides, and sums up like everyone who’s been part of the whole Dhoni journey does, that the man has overall remained the same. Chhotu recalls how you could never make out whether he had had a good day or a bad one based on his demeanour.

  ‘He would just be there sitting quietly. On and off, he would say something, but his focus was always only on his game.’ It’s this incredible and distinctive equanimity of his friend that Chhotu believes will keep their friendship going the same way it always has.

  ‘Woh run maare, tabh mere saath hoga, jab nahi maarega, tabhi bhi mere saath hoga. (If he scores runs, he’s with us; if he doesn’t, he’s still with us.) It was the same in his schooldays. Tabhi bhi mera dost tha, aaj India ke liye khel raha hain, abhi bhi mera dost hai. (Then too he was my friend, and now that he’s playing for India, he still remains my friend.)’

  Dhoni’s love for Ranchi is one reason Chhotu is confident—no, this is not one of his predictions—that it’ll be like the old days all over again once his playing days are over. ‘I don’t think he’ll ever leave Ranchi and go. Finally, he’ll have time for us again once he decides to retire. That part will never change. Mahal mein rehna bhi pata hai, aur chote se kamre mein bhi. Jab nahi tha, waise hi tha. Jab bahut hai, waisa hi hai . . . (He knows how to live in a palace and also in a small room. When he didn’t have anything, he was like that. Now when he has a lot, he’s still like that . . .) That’s Mahi.’

  5

  The Fauji Captain

  On the morning of 17 March 2017, the Jharkhand one-day team had to hastily evacuate ITC Welcome, a five-star hotel in Delhi’s Dwarka area. The players were having breakfast when they suddenly encountered thick smoke emanating from a fire that had broken out in one part of the property. There was understandable panic in the restaurant area. But one member of the Jharkhand team that was in Delhi for the Vijay Hazare Trophy (fifty-over domestic tournament) was in a strange way feeling exhilarated.

  It was he who took charge of the evacuation procedure, coolly and calmly asking his teammates to not go hunting for their mobile phones and instead, assemble at a particular spot before getting out safely. This wasn’t M.S. Dhoni in his Captain Cool avatar. This was honorary Lt Col Mahendra Singh Dhoni from the 106 Parachute Regiment of the Territorial Army leading his troops towards safety in a perilous mission.

  Thankfully, the Jharkhand team escaped unscathed but their match had to be postponed since their kitbags were stuck inside the hotel.

  A few days later, Dhoni would recount the incident with great excitement to Colonel Vembu Shankar, his close army associate and dear friend. The hotel fire was, after all, exactly the kind of crisis scenario that the two would often discuss dealing with. In these discussions, they often imagined Dhoni making a quick escape through kitchens and secret doors to avoid the mob eagerly awaiting an opportunity to catch a glimpse of him in every hotel lobby around the country, and at times, even overseas. As Col Shankar reveals, there would be a very obvious spring in his friend’s stride as they would reach Dhoni’s car parked in an undisclosed section of the hotel through a dark alley. In these brief yet thrilling moments, he would get to play the one role that he’s most desperately wanted to in life—and one that’s unlikely to ever come his way: M.S. Dhoni the fauji.

  ‘Most of his exit routes would involve some part of the basement with no phone signal, and even as we would be guided out by one of the hotel staff, he would ask, “Abhi kuch ho gaya toh, kaise niklenge? (If something happens now, how will we escape?)” His mind is always working at how we can improvise and react to emergency situations. He was quite thrilled about having taken charge during that Delhi fire incident,’ Col Shankar says.

  The colonel, himself a gallantry award winner who has now retired, isn’t the only Dhoni confidant who insist
s that ‘woh dil, deemag se pura fauji hai (he’s a complete soldier, in heart and mind)’. Col Shankar goes on to say that if he’d been in the army, Dhoni would have made a great leader, even if he didn’t rise to being a general or a brigadier, because, as he explains, ‘MS is not too great at long-distance running and I’m not sure if he would have had an interest in the studies needed to finish courses and rise through the ranks.’ But Col Shankar is confident that Dhoni would have led good and successful operations, and been a great leader to those serving under him. He points to the Delhi fire incident again as an example.

  ‘Such thinking at a juncture of adversity is what a leader should be able to do. I can suggest lovely ideas while speaking, but if I don’t do anything when there is such a thing as a fire, then I’m not a leader.’ He also believes what makes M.S. Dhoni probably the best fauji that isn’t to be is how he understands the core of the army and the pulse of the soldiers. ‘“The core of the army is the soldiers, how they live, how they train and how they fight. He understands it the best.’

  There’s perhaps a link there somewhere between Dhoni the hypothetical military leader and Dhoni the former cricket captain of India. He was neither the most successful player in the team—at the point when he took over—nor the most distinguished, another traditional expectation from an Indian captain, and didn’t hail from one of the major cricket centres of the country either. He was if anything the first small-town superstar to take over the most coveted job in Indian team sport. His decisions were not always popular and often perplexing, but everyone watching knew they were taken with the kind of conviction that you see on the frontline.

  Most importantly, there are very few who played under him who don’t vouch for his leadership skills as he led them through many a successful operation. He was in many ways, India’s first and only fauji captain.