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By:

Kiran D. Tare

21 August 2024 at 11:23:13 am

The Lady of Lord’s

Yastika Bhatia’s maiden Test century at Lord’s crowns the rise of an elegant wicketkeeper-batter who has quietly become indispensable to India’s new generation. Critics may say that there are flashier cricketers than Yastika Bhatia. She does not possess the raw power of a Smriti Mandhana or the aura of a Harmanpreet Kaur. She rarely dominates highlight reels or social media clips. Instead, she has built her reputation through reliability – a quality far more vital. At a time when white-ball...

The Lady of Lord’s

Yastika Bhatia’s maiden Test century at Lord’s crowns the rise of an elegant wicketkeeper-batter who has quietly become indispensable to India’s new generation. Critics may say that there are flashier cricketers than Yastika Bhatia. She does not possess the raw power of a Smriti Mandhana or the aura of a Harmanpreet Kaur. She rarely dominates highlight reels or social media clips. Instead, she has built her reputation through reliability – a quality far more vital. At a time when white-ball cricket prizes spectacle, the 24-year-old wicketkeeper-batter has become one of India’s finest practitioners of the understated virtues of timing, patience and composure. Bhatia’s 113 against England which powered the Indian women’s side to a historic win at Lord’s was not merely her maiden Test century but the first ever scored by a woman at cricket’s most celebrated venue. The innings helped India seal a comprehensive 270-run victory in the first women’s Test ever staged at Lord’s. Her hundred earned her a place on the Lord’s honours board, where generations of the game’s greatest names have been immortalised. Few entries have carried quite the same symbolism. Until now, no woman’s name had appeared there for a Test century because no women’s Test had ever been played at the ground. Bhatia’s career has mirrored the evolution of Indian women’s cricket itself. Born in Vadodara, she emerged through Gujarat’s domestic circuit at a time when opportunities for young women were expanding but remained far from abundant. A naturally gifted left-hander, she impressed selectors with a technique that appeared more classical than contemporary. Where modern batting often relies on innovation and improvisation, Bhatia’s game is rooted in balance. She plays late, favours placement over power and rarely appears rushed. Such attributes explain why coaches have long regarded her as especially suited to the demands of Test cricket, even though women are offered precious few opportunities to play the format. Modern wicketkeepers are expected to contribute almost as specialist batters while maintaining relentless concentration over long periods. Bhatia has embraced both responsibilities, becoming an important cog in an Indian side that has steadily shed its dependence on a handful of senior stars. That transformation has accelerated dramatically over the past year. India’s maiden Women’s ODI World Cup triumph marked a watershed for the sport, confirming that the country's women could finally translate promise into silverware. Although Bhatia missed that campaign after suffering an anterior cruciate ligament injury shortly before the tournament, her absence perhaps underscored her growing importance. Months of rehabilitation restored her confidence. If the World Cup represented the one that got away, Lord’s offered redemption. Returning to international cricket only recently, Bhatia produced an innings of remarkable maturity against England’s experienced attack. Her 113 came from 158 balls, balancing restraint with authority as India tightened their grip on the match. She admitted that six months earlier, while beginning rehabilitation, the idea of seeing her name on the Lord’s honours board would have seemed implausible. Those who know her were scarcely surprised. Former Indian wicketkeeper Kiran More, who has mentored Bhatia, has long spoken of her temperament rather than merely her talent. Scoring a century at Lord’s, he observed, is an ambition shared by virtually every cricketer. Achieving it after months away from the game simply reflected the resilience that had always underpinned her cricket. But hers was not a sentimental century assembled through fortune. It was a technically accomplished performance built on judgement outside off stump, crisp drives through the covers and the patience required by the longest format. It showcased precisely why Test cricket continues to matter. Unlike Twenty20, where brilliance can be compressed into a handful of overs, the five-day game rewards concentration accumulated over hours. For Indian women’s cricket, Bhatia’s century represents something larger than an individual milestone. It demonstrates the increasing depth of a side that is no longer defined solely by its biggest names. New heroes are emerging, backed by stronger domestic structures, better coaching and a professionalism unimaginable a decade ago. The honours board at Lord’s records statistics with characteristic restraint. It simply notes that Yastika Bhatia scored a century. Future generations may glance at the name without appreciating the path that led there. But Indian cricket will remember that the first woman to reach three figures at Lord’s was not merely making history. She was announcing that a new generation has arrived.

Encroachment Politics

Delhi
Delhi

An anti-encroachment drive should ideally be a modest municipal exercise. Instead, the one near Delhi’s Ramlila Maidan has become another case study in how routine governance is repeatedly converted into controversy. Acting on a Delhi High Court order, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi began removing unauthorised structures adjoining the Syed Faiz Elahi mosque and a nearby graveyard at Turkman Gate. Following frenzied speculation that the mosque was about to be demolished, an irate mob which gathered within hours pelted stones with such fury that several police personnel were injured in the melee.


In November, the High Court had directed the MCD and the Public Works Department to clear nearly 39,000 sq ft of encroachments at Ramlila Ground. Notices were issued in December. The civic body demarcated the land, stating that the mosque itself, occupying 0.195 acres, lay outside the proposed action, while adjoining structures did not.


A pattern, evident in the Turkman demolition drive is that the moment a surveyor’s tape or a bulldozer appears anywhere near a mosque, a predictable escalation follows. Recent years have witnessed the hysteria at Sambhal to other pockets of Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, where even preliminary surveys have repeatedly been met with violence.


The Delhi Police’s search for a local YouTuber, Salman, accused of using social media to mobilise residents during the Turkman Gate violence, adds a revealing layer to the episode.


The episode was clearly not just misinformation spreading organically but amplification with sinister intent. The rise of such hyperlocal ‘influencers’ who livestream civic action as communal threat raises an obvious question: who sustains them? How is it that what begins as a municipal notice decreed by the court gets rapidly reframed online as “Muslims under attack” - a narrative that travels effortlessly from fringe channels to mainstream commentary?


Equally telling is the reflex of a section of left-liberal opinion that reads routine civic enforcement through a permanent lens of minority peril. For such people, court orders are stripped of all legal context and recast as ‘cultural aggression.’


Leaders from the Samajwadi Party were quick to describe the Turkman Gate violence as an “action–reaction,” arguing that rumours made such an outcome inevitable. This formulation is revealing as it conveniently shifts responsibility away from those who threw stones and towards an abstract sense of hurt, as though misinformation were a mitigating circumstance. It also reflects a broader political habit of part of certain Opposition parties who have thrived on vote-bank and identity politics which is to treat any administrative action involving minority neighbourhoods, however legal, as inherently provocative.


Agreed that the Turkman Gate still carries memories of the Emergency-era demolitions of the 1970s, when coercive clearances left deep scars. One can contend that that past may explain local anxiety. However, that has no connection with the current episode where the bulldozers had come to raze patently illegal structures nor does it excuse political leaders who trade in insinuation instead of reassurance. In fact, reports showed that the bulldozers exposed more than illegal structures. A number of local street vendors, who spoke out after the Turkman Gate action, revealed how money was extorted at the dargah even from poor and helpless people for marriages and rituals.


Parties such as the Congress and the Samajwadi Party have long positioned themselves as guardians of minority interests. In practice, that guardianship, too often, has taken the form of mobilising fear. By hinting that routine enforcement is a ‘communal’ act, they turn legal disputes into identity conflicts.


What truly corrodes minority interests is not the bulldozer but the politics that treats Muslims as a permanent emergency who are too volatile for normal governance and too aggrieved for civic rules. By validating the stone-pelting as a ‘justified’ reaction, such parties infantilise the very voters they claim to protect, reducing them to a mob to be mobilised rather than citizens to be represented.


Urban India has an encroachment problem that cuts across communities and classes. Addressing it will be contentious. The choice is between managing that contention through law and administration, or inflaming it through rumour and political opportunism. The events at Ramlila Maidan suggest that too many still prefer the latter. 


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