The angle grinder’s shrillness fills
the three-room workshop. Ram Bhandari peers critically at the cricket bat he’s
repairing, holds it firmly and goes through with an imaginary forward drive.
Apparently satisfied the ball would reach the boundary, he lines up the bat
with the others against the wall.
This is the room from where many
cricketing greats, including the ‘God’ who will say bye soon, get their bats.
Ram, 52, specializes in resetting cricket bats as per a batsman’s requirement
and has been serving many in the Indian cricket team for several years.
So, when Sachin Tendulkar signs
off from international cricket in November, Bhandari’s loss is two-fold — a
favourite player and a prestigious customer. “It hurts more when I think of
losing our finest player. No one can match his talent,” Bhandari says.
“He asks me to come when he’s at the nets.
He sometimes wants me to sit through practice and then discuss the bat. When I
finally give the bat and he is satisfied, he gives a thumbs-up and says ‘Good
work’,” he says at his small place tucked away in Iliaz Nagar near Kumaraswamy
Layout, South Bangalore.
Bhandari started making bats for
Tendulkar in 2004. As a child, he learnt carpentry from his grandfather and
applied the skills to fixing bats after trying his hand at many things,
including stunts in movies, driving BBMP trucks and biding time as a security
guard.
After fixing bats for local
cricketers, he happened to do it for Rahul Dravid who introduced him
to others at the National Cricket Academy based here. Now, he does it for many
players, including Dhoni, Sehwag and Raina. He also gets requests from
international players and NRIs.
“Each batsman has a different
specification for his bat. Some want it light, others heavy. Some need longer
handles or longer blades. The specification for curves varies with people. I
watch them play and see their footwork. I get their master bat, the ones
they’ve been most successful with, and use it to design the new ones that come from
the companies. The work ranges from balancing to seasoning and plastering.
Sometimes, bats come for repair,” explains Bhandari, who makes six to seven
bats for Tendulkar every year.
Bhandari, who is from Bihar,
relocated to Bangalore in 1979. He spends most of his time, starting from
around 6am, in the workshop making bats or fixing them.
“My dream is that Sachin breaks
Brian Lara’s record of 400 runs in a Test— that’s one of the few records he
doesn’t hold. He should do that as well in his last two Tests”
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