The most embarrassing battle of Indian cricket, when 2 cricketers of Team India were beaten on the ground
Many experts call it the most disgusting incident of scuffle in the first class cricket match. This is a story of assault between Test players Rashid Patel and Raman Lamba in the Duleep Trophy final in Jamshedpur in 1990-91. There was an argument between the two. After that bowler Rashid tried to kill Lamba by uprooting the stump and Lamba ran towards him on the argument to save himself. It seemed as if a fencing was going on. One of the most embarrassing stories of Indian cricket is a long ban on both the players involved. Let’s go directly to that match:
Match: North Zone vs. West Zone, Dalip Trophy Final, Jamshedpur, 25-29 January 1991
North Zone 729/9 declared innings (Raman Lamba 180, Manoj Prabhakar 143, Kapil Dev 119, Chetan Mankad 3-111) and 59/0
West Zone 561 (Ravi Shastri 152, Dilip Vengsarkar 114, Sanjay Manjrekar 105)
North zone victorious
What happened: The Dalip Trophy was between the final West Zone (Captain: Ravi Shastri) and the North Zone (Captain: Kapil Dev). When there was a confrontation, Kiran More, West Zone was captaining the team and Rashid Patel was in his team while Raman Lamba was in the North Zone Team.
North Zone batted first and declared the innings at 729–9 in which opener Lamba scored 180 runs. It was such a big score that it was generally assumed that the trophy was captured by the North Zone. West Zone scored 561 runs in response and the match was over here. On the fifth day, when the game in the match looked just the same formality and was almost over, then suddenly it seemed to be in it. In fact, West Zone fast bowler Rashid was setting foot on the Danger area of the pitch and Lamba was upset to see it. When there was a debate, Rashid threw a beer at Lamba in response and this worsened.
Lamba was then on 26* run and suddenly Rashid started bowling short pitch. It seemed that his intention was only to hurt Lamba. Kiran More shouted towards Rashid in Gujarati and it was probably a gesture to break Lamba. Lamba did not know Gujarati, so he did not know anything about this scheme. When Rashid shouted and told Kiran More that the ball was not going fast, More told him again in Gujarati to come forward from the bowling crease and throw the ball to hit Lamba. Then Rashid bowled several yards from the bowling crease and the fate of Lamba was good in front of him that he did not get any injury.
When Lamba ran towards the umpire to complain, he clashed with Rashid and in anger, Rashid shouted not only that he wants to kill him, ran towards the batsman’s end and took out a stump and killed him towards Lamba. The target was missed and the stumps straight, Ajay Jadeja, standing close to Lamba, started going. Ajay Jadeja understood Gujarati and understood what was happening? They shout at Lamba to save themselves from Rashid and participate. Then Lamba took the bat in front of him to save himself and ran away, but Rashid was also running after him with the stump in his hand. By then umpire VK Ramaswamy and West Zone and other players came in the middle and stopped Rashid.
what happened after that: In those days, there was a lot of crowd to watch domestic matches in the stadium, but what the crowd saw in this match was very shameful. This made the crowd angry and riot started. The crowd started throwing stones at the stadium, causing the match to be canceled immediately. The video of what happened is present on social media and it is clearly visible that in a few seconds a quarrel started between the two players. Thanks to the lead of the first innings, North Zone was declared the winner but did not win cricket that day.
A few years later, Rashid said, ‘Look, cricketers are usually good people, but sometimes something happens that causes heat in the atmosphere and the situation dominates you. In my case, I was troubled by North Zone scoring more than 700 runs.
Who got punishment: The BCCI formed the Discipline Committee (Member: BCCI Chief, Mansoor Ali Khan Pataudi and Raj Singh Dungarpur) which after investigation suspended Rashid Patel for 13 months and Raman Lamba for 10 months. The biggest question is why Lamba was punished? The committee actually assumed that Lamba was also not completely innocent and also deteriorated due to his Rashid showing the bat and getting into a debate. Therefore, it is believed that even an attack or attempt to attack in the excitement is not right. Another surprising thing is that Kiran More who asked Lamba to kill, he did not get any punishment.
Raman Lamba approached the Delhi High Court to challenge the ban’s decision. On 19 December 1991, the court did not consider the application to be further action and rejected it.
