by Abhishek Mukherjee

February, 1961.

VV Kumar, the debutant Indian leg-spinner, had made instant impact at Kotla, with figures of 5/64 (and 2/68). The first-innings spell featured "a googly that had the ball hanging in the air, before dipping and going through his defence," a ball he would hail as the best he has bowled.

It was a tremendous feat, and the youngster obviously wanted to watch a video of his wickets, but Doordarshan was still a thing of the future.

But there used to be a television camera at the ground, to capture moments of every sporting events. These were shown as part of a newsreel in places the public places – movie theatres, for example.

So our hero purchased a ticket for Dilip Kumar's Daag at Wellington Cinema – and got to watch himself in action.

That was the last Test of the series. He would play only once more for India, at Bombay against England the following season. This was a bizarre outing. He did not pick up a wicket in the first innings, and Contactor did not ask him to bowl in the 58-over second innings. He explained that he did not want to expose his mystery leg-spinner so early in the series. As things turned out, he did not play another Test.

VV Kumar's First-Class record was phenomenal. One way to compare him to the great Indian spinners of the era would be to remove the Test records for all of them. If one does that, Kumar's average (19.88) is better than those of Bedi (20.25), Prasanna (21.74), Chandra (22.35), and Venkat (22.64). He was the first to the 300- and 400-wicket landmarks in Ranji Trophy.

Venkat and Kumar formed a deadly pair for Madras (later Tamil Nadu), often locking horns with Prasanna and Chandra of Mysore (later Karnataka) in South Zone clashes. Unfortunately, with Gupte in the Indian side, it was difficult for a second leg-spinner to break through.

VV Kumar was born on 22 June 1935.