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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.

IRCTC blew up Rs 2600-cr for website upkeep

Mumbai: The Railway Ministry’s listed ‘Navratna’ company, Indian Railway Catering & Tourism Corporation Ltd. (IRCTC) has admitted under RTI that it spent a whopping Rs.2,619 crore for the maintenance and upkeep of its website, www.irctc.com.

 

The amount – data available for the past three years - is collected as the innocuous-sounding ‘Convenience Fees’ from crores of passengers annually booking online tickets on the IRCTC website.

 

The Convenience Fees (CF) collected were: Rs 802-crore (2022-2023), Rs 863-crore (2023-2024) and last year’s Rs. 954-crore (2024-2025) – totaling to a staggering Rs. 2,619 crore.

 

The IRCTC stated that it collects only CFs for online bookings of tickets and does not charge a separate Transaction Fee (TF) from the prospective travelers.

 

The revelation was made in response to a RTI query posed by Pune businessman Prafful Sarda, seeking details of the IRCTC’s CF revenues starting from 2004.

 

“However, it was declined on grounds that it was a huge data which was not readily available and doled out the hair-raising figures of the last 3 years. There are different categories of the CF charges, as per the RTI reply,” Sarda told ‘The Perfect Voice’.

 

The 27-year-old company said the CF collected for online bookings is ploughed back for “the upkeep, maintenance and running of the website”.

 

For booking through IRCTC Sleeper Class tickets, the CF is Rs. 15+GST and for all air-conditioned class bookings, the CF is Rs 30+GST.

 

However, for online ticket bookings through BHIM or any other UPI, the IRCTC levies Rs 10+GST for all non-AC tickets and Rs 20+GST for AC classes.

 

On an average, 12,38,000 tickets were booked daily (2023-2024), or more than 45-crore tickets annually from the IRCTC website, and the CF amounts are non-refundable.

 

“When a single government service portal collects such astronomical amounts from customers as CF, what about other similar public-private portals and their massive incomes by this route,” asked Sarda.

 

Criminal loot

Council for Protection of Rights President, Barrister Vinod Tiwari said this amounts to a ‘criminal loot’ which IRCTC is disguising as expense for maintenance of its website.

 

“This simply reeks of a scam. No website needs such an amount only for the upkeep-maintenance, as IRCTC claims. The CBI must probe this fraud and bring out the details before the public,” demanded Barr. Tiwari.

 

Terming it as ‘blatant fleecing’ of passengers, Mumbai stock market consultant Rajesh Shah said CF’s are levied by practically all service websites of banks, utilities and other providers, many take a percentage of the transaction amount, so the consumer is in the dark about what amount is actually deducted.

 

“The government should stop this, and must intervene to announce a flat CF of One Rupee for any online transaction/s, irrespective of the amount. Already extra charges are levied for a certain number of ATM withdrawals/transactions, besides the GST,” Shah told ‘The Perfect Voice’.

 

Though IRCTC said the option of booking tickets offline is also available, it controls a stupendous 83 per cent of the online ticketing on the Indian Railways (IR), and the remaining paltry 17 per cent is divided among multitudes of private players and tour operators.

 

A high-ranking IR source suspects something amiss as such a huge amount is not required to be diverted for merely upkeep and maintenance of a website.

 

IRCTC: Jewel in the railways’ crown

Set up in Sep. 1999, the New Delhi-based IRCTC is the professional hospitality and travel arm of IR for upgradation of catering services over IR and boost rail-bound domestic and in-bound tourism in the country.

 

It is intended to upgrade, professionalize and manage the catering and hospitality services at railway stations, on trains, etc, to promote domestic and international tourism through development of budget hotels, special tour packages, information, commercial publicity and global reservation systems.

 

IRCTC’s core activities are: Catering & Hospitality, Internet Ticketing, Travel & Tourism, Packaged Drinking Water (‘Rail Neer’) through 19 plants across India, and its operations are sprawled across 5 Zonal Offices, 10 Regional Offices, and one Internet Ticketing and Tourism Office each in New Delhi.

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