City loses braveheart of hockey
| Date :24-Nov-2020 |
By Paritosh Pramanik :
■ INTERNATIONAL HOCKEY UMPIRE GURUMURTHY PILLAY NO MORE
MORNING Sat Vidarbha Hockey Association ground off Amravati Road won’t be same again. The Sun would rise as usual but the morning rays will miss kissing the ‘Son of Soil’ GurumurthyPillayonthe‘field’. Guru Anna, as he was fondly called in hockey circles all over the country, peacefully left for heavenly abode on early Monday morning at a city hospital. It was ‘final whistle’ for Guru Anna at the ripe age of 83. The Almighty ‘blew the final hooter’ for the ‘Braveheart of Vidarbha’. Guru Anna lived for hockey intrue sense. In 2004,he fought thepainoflosinghissonRakesh to Tsunami only to serve the game. He decided not to go in searchofhisson,whowasswept away by Tsunami, to Chennai and stayed back in Nagpur to overlook the preparations of West Zone and All India InterUniversityHockeycompetition of which he was Technical Director.(Evenafter16years,his sonhasnotyet returnedhome.) Guru Anna could not hold back his tears when this scribe touched the most painful topic on January 8, 2005, when he wasbusy giving finaltouches to theVHA field for theWest Zone meetwhichwasafewdaysaway. “It’sGodwish(takingawayhis son).
We are all his puppets. What would have I done at Chennai. God willing my son would be back soon… hockey has given me everything and today it’s time I pay itback.This isGod’s wish.I am sure he is still alive and will come back soon,” a tearful Guru Anna had said as he minutely watched fixing the goalpost. The All India tournament went past smoothly and GuruAnna earnedpraiseforhis organisationalskillswhichhedid singlehandedly. Guru Anna was a guru (teacher)forumpiresofthecity. It was only because of Guru Anna, after SL Narwaria, Nagpur’sformerhockeyplayers tooktoumpiringandwonaccolades.PramodJain,RaviFrancis, RajeshBihari,SunilMadne, late Dharamraj Kanojiya,to name a few,wereproductsofGuruAnna who was always there to help them,dayornight.
GuruAnna’s ‘classes’ wouldcontinuetilllate nightinSadaruntiltheumpires hadreceivedsatisfyinganswers. The adage ‘age is just a number’ aptly suited Guru Anna. Lookingathisfitnessandhealth nonewouldbelieve thattheformer India player, who played against visiting Japan and East Germany teams in 1968, had crossed the age of 80. Since decades, not a single day would pass without Guru Anna visiting the VHA ground in the morning as well as in evenings. Occasionally, he would miss the evening sessions, but never the mornings. Taking his seat at the corner ofapproachroadoftheground, Guru Anna could be seen reading newspaper thoroughly. In between, he used to glance through his glares and watch players dribble during their morning practice sessions. It used to be an interesting morning session with Guru Anna as he had bagful of anecdotesfromhisplayingtoumpiring days.
“While umpiring, you have to be extra smart, more than players,” Guru Anna used to say. Guru Anna was not keeping wellforpastcoupleofweeksafter hesufferedafallathisSadarresidence.“Hewasdoingwellafter thatfallathome. Butforlastfew days he was not keeping well. He got weak as he was not taking his daily meals properly,” his daughter Bhuneshwari Mudliar told ‘The Hitavada’. “Yesterday only Dad said he wanted to go to VHA ground and I was prepared to take him in the morning. But he felt uneasinessonSundaynightand we took him to the hospital.
Earlymorninghepassed away,” his son Yogesh informed. Anexcellentmidfielder, Guru Anna played for Vidarbha and Central Railways headquarters formorethantwodecades.After he decided to quit competitive hockey, Guru Anna decided to take the whistle and learn the tricks of the trade of hockey umpire. He succeeded in that too and went on to officiate as umpire at scores of Indian Hockey Federation organised nationals. Later, he was tasked withthejobofTechnicalOfficial. That job too was handled with precision. With experience, Guru Anna was elevated as Technical Director and was handedseveraltop-notchcompetitions of the country which included Senior, Junior Nationals across the country, Bombay Gold Cup, Aga Khan GoldCup,MurugappaGoldCup and many more. Guru Anna hadaknack of handling any situation. Once, while handling the technical table during a match of a local league tournament at VHA ground,onedepartmentalteam whichwastrailingagainstaclub side,claimedbadlightandasked to stop the game.
Some10oddminuteswereleft on the clock and the light was good enough to complete the match. But the team did not budge. Guru Anna then decided to stop the match that evening and said that the remainingpartwouldbeplayed next morning atthe given time. He also orderedthatif any team does not reach on time, the matchwouldbe awardedtothe team present on the field. The next morning, the departmental team failed to reach on time and the match was awarded to the club side. “Iwassuretheseindisciplined guys would not reach on time, hence I gave them morning time,”GuruAnnahadreasoned. The mornings won’t be same again. Rest in Peace Guru Anna!