Tour of Australia 1947-48         Captain: Lala Amarnath

India’s fourth official Test tour

First Test-playing tour of Australia by India

  (October 1947 -

      March 1948)

This was the first tour made by India, as opposed to All-India, the country having been finally partitioned in August 1947 when Great Britain granted full independence to India, Ceylon and Pakistan. The original tour party included Fazal Mahmood but five months after his original selection he dropped out giving his allegiance to the new country of Pakistan.  Amir Elahi and Gul Mohammad, who subsequently represented Pakistan in Test cricket, retained their places in the team, although they made clear that on returning home they would be migrating to Pakistan.

Apart from brief flights in a seaplane across the Tasman Sea, no touring party except the 1946 Indians had flown to the country they were visiting for a Test tour. The 1947-48 team was intended to sail on the 'Orion' but it was delayed and they would have been obliged to cancel matches so it was decided to fly.  The team flew throughout the trip but, if this saved travel fatigue, it did little for results in the Test series.  The Australians were far too strong for India, with brilliant players at the top of their form in every department of the game, as would be conclusively shown on the forthcoming Australian tour of England in 1948. Nevertheless the Indians became a very popular side because of their entertaining play and the spirit in which they approached the state matches.

The Indians were weakened by some significant withdrawals - Mushtaq Ali and Merchant, as well as Fazal.  However, these losses were made worse when some of those on the touring party's original short-list do not appear to have come under consideration for the vacancies, while Ranvirsinhji and Rai Singh gained places thanks to friends on the Board pulling strings.

Bradman described the bowling attack as steady and sound but lacking both a really fast bowler and a high-class spinner, as well as not being backed up in the field. The tour was India's first to any country other than England, a proposed visit to Australia in 1927-28 having fallen through.

Other Indian tours

Previous tours

England 1946

Next tour

England 1952

Next Australian tour

1967-68

Members of the Test tour  party  (17)

Opening batsmen: Chandu Sarwate, M S Ranvirsinhji

Middle-order batsmen: Hemu Adhikari, Gogumal Kishenchand, Kanwar Rai Singh, Gul Mohammad, Vijay Hazare, Khandu Rangnekar.

All rounders:  Vinoo Mankad, Lala Amarnath

Wicket-keepers:Khokhan Sen, Jamshed ‘Jenni’ Irani

Spinners: Amir Elahi, C S Nayudu

Fast bowlers:Dattu Phadkar, Commandur Rangachari, Ranga Sohoni.

Zonal representation

 Quadrangular teams

E: East Zone (3), N: North (4), S: South (2),  W: West (8)

 Ranji Trophy teams

Ba - Baroda (4)

Bn  - Bengal (1)

B  -  Bombay (2)

Gj - Gujarat (1)

Hk  - Holkar (2)

Ka -  Kathiawar (1)

Ms - Madras (1)

Mh -  Maharashtra (1)

Nw -  Nawangar (1)

Sn -  Sind (1)

S Pj   - South Punjab (2)

Average age of players at time of first Test match

(28 Nov 1947) :

    28 yrs 11 months.

Test Appearances made before the tour

Amarnath 6, Nayudu 6, Hazare 3, Mankad 3, Sohoni 2, Gul 1, Sarwate 1, Adhikari 0, Amir Elahi 0, Irani 0, Kishenchand 0, Phadkar 0, Rai Singh 0, Rangachari 0, Rangnekar 0, Ranvirsinhji 0, Sen 0.

Tour Officials

Selectors

The selectors who chose the original party after the last trial match in Delhiwere C K Nayudu, P E Palia and D B Deodhar, with V M Merchant as adviser.  Mr Pankaj Gupta (convenor) and Mr Anthony S DeMello (Board President) was also present at the selection meeting.  Deodhar later resigned from the committee.

Selection

Unavailable:  The Nawab of Pataudi senior.

Tour Party Announced : March 1947

Not selected     Nazar Mohammad, Chowdhury and Shinde might have been expected to number in the original tour party, or at least among the replacements.

The players were asked to attend a training camp in Poona (Pune) in August but for two weeks the monsoon rain prevented any practice and the camp was abandoned.

Withdrawals : During the summer of 1947 members of the team began to withdraw.

Fazal Mahmood (Northern India), 20, was recruited into the police force in Lahore.  Mushtaq Ali (Holkar), 32, a member of the tour committee as a senior player, said he did not wish to go away at a time of family bereavement (he was mourning his brother, Iqbal Ali).

Rusi Modi (Bombay), 22, said he was not fit enough to travel. 

The most significant loss was of the appointed captain, Vijay M Merchant (Bombay), 35, through problems of fitness.  On 27 August he had flown to South Africa to see a specialist bone setter and on 4 September he was given three weeks in which to establish his fitness, but two days later it was announced that he had withdrawn and Amarnath would lead the tour.

V S Hazare seemed unlikely to go owing to the delicate situation in Baroda but he did eventually agree to join the tour, being appointed to the vice-captaincy on 6 October.

Replacements :  Therefore four replacements were required and the meeting to choose them kept getting deferred, from September 8th to 10th, to 16th, to 1st October and so on.  Eventually it took place on 6 October when the tour committee and DeMello chose Rai Singh, Rangachari, Ranvirsinhji and Sarwate. Owing to all the travelling upheaval caused by partition, it had taken skipper Amarnath five days to reach this meeting and finalise the team. 

Deodhar said it was all very autocratic on the part of the Board President to have ignored the constitutionally elected selection committee, which was not given notice of the meeting proposed for 16 Sept.and not proper to let the tour selection committee pick the four replacements before the team had actually left India. He then resigned from his position as a selector.

Time between selection and departure from India

  approx 200 days

 (March - 8 October)

Travel

Calcutta   Q  Perth

On 8 October 1948 the first thirteen players flew from Calcutta to Singapore, via Rangoon and Penang where they spent the first night. On 9 October they took off for Sourabaya but were denied permission to stay in Indonesia so flew on to Port Darwin, and arrived in Perth on 10 October.

Sarwate was the first of the replacement players to arrive, reaching Adelaide on 23 October, after five days on the plane.  Ranvirsinhji,  Rai Singh and Rangachari arrived in Sydney on 27 October and joined the tour party in Melbourne two days later.

Time spent in Australia

   143 days

(10 October - 1 March)

On-tour selection committee

Lala Amarnath (captain),  Vijay Hazare (vice-captain), Vinoo Mankad and  Pankaj Gupta (manager).

Reinforcements

None

Fixtures/Results

† not first-class

Time spent in Australia before First Test:

 49 days

(10 October - 28 November)

Test appearances on tour

5  -  Adhikari, Amarnath, Gul Mohammad, Hazare, Mankad, Sarwate.

4  -  Kishenchand, CS Nayudu, Phadkar.

3  -  Rangnekar, Sen.

2  -  Irani, Rangachari.

1  -  Amir Elahi, Rai Singh, Sohoni.

0  -  Ranvirsinhji.

Highlights

•    Don Bradman scored his 100th hundred for an Australian XI in a tour match at the SCG

•    Mankad (116) and Sarwate put on 124 for the first wicket in the 3rd Test at Melbourne

•    Vinoo Mankad hit two centuries at Melbourne, the other being a score of 111 in the 5th Test

•    Vijay Hazare struck his two centuries (116 and 145)  in the Adelaide match.

•    Dattu Phadkar, who also scored a century  (123) in the 4th Test, hit three fifties as well.

Tour Summary

Return to India

Fremantle   T   Bombay

                ‘Stratheden’

After their gruelling flight to Australia in October, the tourists were happy to sail slowly back home. The 'Stratheden' left Fremantle on 1 March 1948 and sailed by way of Colombo.  The players turned down requests to play in Ceylon because they had been on such an arduous tour.

The ship reached Bombay on the evening of 10 March.  They docked and boarded the train at Mole Station, Ballard Pier.

Time away from India

  154 days 

 (8 October to 10 March)

Finances

The tour made a loss of nearly Rs 30 000.

Published accounts of the tour

"Indian Cricketers in Australia"    L. N Mathur

"Indian Cricketers in Australia"    Vic Richardson

Postscript