Bombay Gymkhana, 1935-36.
Jack Ryder's men were touring India. This was nowhere close to a full-strength Australian side, but then, they were playing Bombay, not an all-India side.
Ryder declared on 455/8. Bowled out for 241, Bombay were asked to follow on.
Charlie Macartney did not play the match, but he was at the venue. He had seen LP Jai score 59 in the first innings. "The exhibition of scientific batsmanship", he wrote in his column for The Hindu.
Now Jai walked out at 4/1, two positions higher than in the first innings. By the time SM Kadri, the other opener, fell for 5, Jai had taken the score to 37.
Fred Mair reduced Bombay to 45/4 when Jai decided to counterattack. Mair's 13 overs went for 73.
Stumps were drawn when Jai hit one back to Harry Alexander for 115. Bombay were 171/7 from a mere 40 overs – a rate quick enough for a First-Class match even today. And the runs had come from one batsman.
Macartney was elated: "I can truly say that I have seldom seen finer batting than that of Jai. His footwork and stroke execution were perfect. Every stroke was magnificently timed and powerfully made. Jai plays with easy confidence, charming style and above all is a good sportsman."
Similarly, Vasant Raiji: "Those who watched this spectacle went into raptures and will remember it for many a long day as one of the finest seen on Bombay Gymkhana ground."
The correspondents at the ground compared his wrist-work with Ranji's and his stroke-play with Nayudu's.
Less than a week later, India played an unofficial 'Test' against the oppositions at the same ground. Jai was left out.
"A team in which Jai cannot find a place must be a team of world beaters," wrote Macartney. He was not aware of Vizzy and his Machiavellian plans that would probably have been soiled had Jai played – and led.
Indeed, Jai would have been ideal choice as captain. After all, he was the first captain to win the Ranji Trophy the previous season.
India lost by 9 wickets.
He was selected for the next 'Test', at Calcutta, but Imperial Bank, his employers, told him that he had run out of leaves. Jai had to choose between the 'Test' or play Ranji Trophy. He chose the latter.
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Some of Jai's great performances came in the Quadrangular. Consider the 1924-25 final, where he came out to bat in an almost identical situation. The Muslims scored 368, bowled out the Hindus for 120, and enforced the follow on.
Jai came out at three. Deodhar, at six. When the latter fell for 66, the partnership had already yielded 191. Jai got 156. Evening News observed how "the student outshone the professor".
Jai scored 104, 23, 80, 71 in the next edition. The last of these helped the Hindus chase 355 against the Europeans in the next edition.
The Europeans would be at the receiving end again, in 1934-35, when Jai and Amar Singh plundered 130 in 51 minutes (reaching 43 in 16, 100 in 37 en route).
He scored two fifties in four innings against Gilligan's MCC, but a spectacular (yet forgotten) run came in bank cricket in 1927. Raiji made an attempt to chroncle these: "On a conservative estimate Jai must have scored over 2,500 runs during the season."
Most of these runs came for Imperial Bank – who, if I may remind, would deny him leave to represent India. This included a six-day phase when he scored 497 runs while getting out only twice.
Unfortunately, these were never given First-Class status.
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Only 67 of his matches (across two decades) were given First-Class status. He scored 3,231 runs at 32. The Hindu Gymkhana boycotted the 1932 tour of England following Gandhi's arrest, while a broken finger prevented him from being at his best in 1936.
The career record was ordinary even by the standards of the era. There were too attractive fifties that were not converted into hundreds. Given his immense talent, why were the big hundreds so rare?
Temperament, explained Merchant: "Had Jai possessed the patience and concentration of a Hazare, he would have scored more runs than any other Indian cricketer. He had every stroke in his repertoire and there was not a single shot which he could not execute. Normally one would think that this would be a tremendous advantage for any batsman. But it was not so with Jai. Because he had too many strokes and inclination to make them, he wanted to give vent to his feelings of joy and happiness by making them all at once."
So Jai was the complete antithesis of Merchant himself. This was curious, because Merchant, by his own admission, was influenced by Jai "by constant observation and contact". He would call Jai his guru despite never having received any formal coaching.
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Macartney, Merchant, and Raiji was not the only admirers. After batting with Jai in the Quadrangular, an awestruck Duleep commented that "had he missed seeing Jai batting he would have missed something in life."
Talyarkhan: "Jai walked to the middle very fast. He took a second to take guard. He rarely took stock of the placing of the field because (as he always told me) he had been studying this while awaiting his turn to bat."
The stance, too, was another thing. "The only person who can match him in the elegance of stance is the late Jack Hobbs," thought Merchant.
He played only one Test, against Jardine's men in 1933-34, the first ever on Indian soil. He scored 19 and 0. He should probably have played more. Or he was probably born a tad too late.
It did not matter. Jai took to billiards with such alarming focus that he went on to become an undisputed champion at Hindu Gymkhana for eleven years.
On January 29, 1968, he had a massive heart attack and passed away. He had been listening to the commentary of the Sydney Test between India and Australia.
LP Jai was born on April 1, 1902. When BCCI introduced the LP Jai Trophy, it was awarded to – fittingly – the scorer of the fastest Ranji hundred every season.