Empire Cricket Booklet

•

INDIAN CRICKET IN NATAL

failing to pay registration fees or if results were not submitted within 72 hours. 69 When the father of a Pirates player died, Greyville agreed to reschedule the match but the Union refused. Nothing was to disrupt fixtures. 70 Manilal Gandhi linked racist practices against Indians to their failure to adopt 'western standards', like cleanliness: 'Do we, the Indian community in South Africa, always observe this good habit (cleanliness)? Are we, in this regard, always "good South Africans"?' 71 By observing every minute rule of the game, by mimicking established ways of taking one's mark, appealing for a dismissal, meticulously dressing in white flannels, celebrating a fifty and leaving the crease, the 'otherness' that so frightened and disgusted the colonists off the field of play would, to some extent, be mitigated. The skin might be dark, but to behave like gentlemen they could 'bloody well be taught'. The idea of 'civilisation' also extended to language. The achievements of white cricketers were greatly admired. DDICU congratulated H. W. Taylor for scoring 250 against Transvaal on 1 and 2 January 1913. 72 In July 1914, DDICU sent a letter to the white Association to record 'the appreciative sense of your Union relative to the great and only victory by Natal over M. C. C. (England) and for the magnificent batting and bowling by H. W. Taylor, A. W. "Dave" Nourse and C. P. Carter'. These gestures are particularly striking, given that Indians had been involved in a lengthy passive resistance campaign against the state from October to December 1913, and that Emamally and Christopher were active participants in that struggle. Administrators and Benefactors Cricket was controlled and played by traders and educated elites. Patrons of DDICU included R. B. Chetty, Parsee Rustomjee and G. H. Miankhan. Rustomjee's involvement is not surprising in the light of his financial position and the fact that the small Parsee community were cricket pioneers in India. He had arrived in Natal in 1880, and was a prominent passive resister and financial supporter of Gandhi. He built orphanages, was a trustee of the Phoenix Trust and Indian Opinion, founder member of the Parsee Rustomjee Library and Community Hall, and

an outstanding sports leader: When he died in 1924 at the age of 63, Pandit Bawani Dayal wrote that 'sport did not escape a place in his generosity and the fact that all the sports meetings were held in his spacious premises in Field Street showed the interest he had taken in Indian sport'. 73 Ramaswami Balaguru (R. B.) Chetty, who arrived from Mauritius in 1896, was proprietor of the Imperial Cigar Manufacturing and Trading Co. and Rex Printing Company. He too was a senior member of the NIC. Miankhan, who arrived in Natal in 1888 and opened a business in Field Street, was one of the richest Indian businessmen in Durban. Chairman Francis of DDICU remarked that he 'was always ready to do anything he could not only by his advice, but freely with his purse. He was a willing giver without the least persuasion'. 74 Administrators were either articulate in English or well-off economically. Recalling the role of admi nistrators in 1950, R. Bughwan, administrator since the 1890s, recalled nostalgically that the 'standard of debate was high in the early days and administrators would discuss complex problems, for four or five hours at each sitting ... Some of the meetings would terminate in the early hours of the morning when the participants would wend their way home, tired but happy ... The training received in the schools of sport has stood them in good stead in other spheres of life.' 75 Most officials held positions in multiple social, religious, educational, economic and political organisations. They did this voluntarily, spurred by a philanthropic impulse, a desire to see improvement in the 'community', sometimes to the detriment of cricket.

Kimberley, 1913: Flirting with Non-Racialism

In January 1913, DDICU affiliated to the South African Coloured Cricket Board (SACCB), which had been formed by Griqualand West, Eastern Province and Western Province in 1902. Members competed for the Barnato Trophy donated by Sir David Harris, president of De Beers Consolidated Mines. Although SACCB's constitution stated that it 'did not recognise any distinction amongst the various sporting peoples of South Africa, whether