The legendary Indian batsman Sachin Tendulkar has not only known for his batting ‘masterclass’ but also for his down-to-earth personality off the field. In the recent past, he has tried his level best to help people on many occasions to those in need and also supports various causes as he is now a Rajya Sabha member as well.
Recently, the ‘Master Blaster’ provided a help of ₹4.5 lakh to the wheelchair cricket team of India, which successfully completed its first international tour of Bangladesh.
It was their dream to wear the national jersey and in order to fulfill that dream, they needed ₹6.5 lakh so that they could travel to Bangladesh for a bilateral series. But despite the secretary of the Wheelchair Cricket India (WCI) Pradeep Raj’s efforts, they could only manage to collect the funding of ₹2 lakh.
It was Pradeep’s idea to approach Sachin Tendulkar for help to realize the dream of wheelchair cricket team. As quoted in PTI, Raj said, “Despite my best efforts, I could only get only one sponsor, who gave ₹2 lakh. I had knocked many doors for our wheelchair team but to no avail. I had Sachin sir’s email address as during my days as a para-athlete (he was a cricketer and then a para TT player), I had e-mailed him. This time also I mailed Sachin sir asking for help.”
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He further elaborated, “To my pleasant surprise, his office got in touch with me within three days and in next few days, he donated the outstanding ₹4.5 lakh. Without his help, the Indian Wheelchair cricket team would have had to cancel their trip to Bangladesh. The financial help provided by him went a long way in booking air tickets for the 19-member team.”
Besides Sachin, BJP MP and actor Manoj Tiwari also donated ₹10,000 to each of the players. The Indian team beat Bangladesh 2-0 in the three-match series. The matches were scheduled to be taking place in Dhaka and the first one was a wash-out due to rain. The Indian team won the next two matches. This is the second time that wheelchair team has played an international series. Last time, they had invited the Bangladesh team to Delhi.
In wheelchair cricket, the matches are held in T20 format.
