by Sumit Gangopadhyay

Padmakar Shivalkar was born on April 14, 1940.
Alongside Rajinder Goel, his career coindiced almost entirely with Bishan Singh Bedi. As a result two peerless left-arm spinners did not get an opportunity to play Test cricket. In his book Idols, Sunil Gavaskar included two non-Test playing crikceters. One was Shivalkar. The other was Goel.

Having started his cricket at Shivaji Park Gymkhana, Shivalkar played for Dadar Union. In 1961-62, he toured Australia with CCI and captured 15 wickets in 3 matches. As a result, he started playing first-class cricket from that season. For the next two decades, he continued in the first-class scene.
He played 74 times for Bombay in Ranji Trophy, capturing 361 wickets. In the Irani Trophy his haul was 51 wickets in 10 matches. Overall he played 86 matches for Bombay capturing 419 wickets.

In the Duleep Trophy, he scalped 74 in 15 matches for West Zone. In the Moin-ud-Daula, his haul was 23 wickets in 7 matches.

He played 9 times against touring sides, accounting for 36 batsmen. He toured Sri Lanka with the Indian side in 1973-74, capturing 11 wickets in 4 matches. In the first of the two unofficial ‘Tests’, he captured 4 for 115 before going wicketless in the other.

Apart from that he played in the Minor County Championships for Durham, representing them in 5 matches and capturing 13 wickets. Durham in those days did not compete in the County Championships.
After virtually ending his Ranji career in 1980-81, he received a surprise summons in 1987-88 and played twice that season without too much success. (He did bowl 46 overs to take 2 for 95 as Bombay won based on a 12-run first-innings lead agaisnt Karnataka in the pre-quarter-final. He was 47.) A 14-year-old Sachin Tendulkar was in that squad but he was considered too young and was not played that season.

Shivalkar ended his career with 589 wickets in 124 matches

(Translated from Bengali by Arunabha Sengupta)