On Sunday, Indian team captain Virat Kohli spoke with Sunil Chhetri during an Instagram live chat show Eleven On Ten. During his interaction, Kohli recalled an incident from his early cricketing days when his father refused to offer a bribe to get Kohli selected in the team. Kohli, who lost his father when was 18 recalled the unbearable loss and shared the life lessons had learned from him.

Virat recalled, “In my home State (Delhi), sometimes things happen which are not fair. On one occasion, a certain someone did not play by the rules when it came to selection criteria.”

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Kohli continued, “He told my father that while I had the merit to be selected.  A little extra (possibly a bribe) was needed to confirm my selection. My father — an honest middle-class man who had worked hard all his life to become a successful lawyer — did not even understand what ‘little extra’ meant. My father simply said, ‘If you want to select Virat, then let it be purely on merit. I will give you nothing extra’.

“I didn’t get selected.  cried a lot; was broken. But that incident taught me a lot. I realized that I had to be extraordinary to become successful and that I had to achieve this purely through my own effort and hard work. My father showed me the right way, through action and not merely words,” he said.

Virat Kohli also revealed how he became even more motivated after his father’s death. He recalls how he played a Ranji match to pursue his dream despite losing his father a day before.

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“I accepted his death, as I was focused on moving forward with my career. In fact, I went and batted in a Ranji Trophy match the day after he died. His death made me realize that I had to make something of my life. I think about how nice it would be if I could have given my father the peaceful retired life that he deserved. At times, I get emotional thinking about him,” Kohli said.