Minimalism at its best: India legend Javagal Srinath takes a metro ride to leave cricket fans awestruck
56-year-old Javagal Srinath, who played four straight World Cups from 1992 to 2003, appears to epitomise a simple life.
Money, success and fame don’t decide how you live. You decide how you live. Former India pacer Javagal Srinath is a classic example of how one should live. He is the achiever of the highest order. In an international career that spanned 12 years, Srinath played 67 Tests and 229 ODIs for India and took more than 550 wickets. Post-retirement, he has been a match referee for a large part and has officiated at some important matches over the years. He is a thinking person, very soft-spoken, and can be funny at times. But here we are talking about his lifestyle, which appears to be very minimalistic.

A post on LinkedIn has gone viral, amassing thousands of likes and hundreds of comments. It has a picture in which Srinath is in a metro coach, leaning against the wall and holding his trolley bag with one hand. He is simply attired, shirt tucked into his jeans, besides wearing a very basic pair of leather shoes.
The gentleman who shared the pic on the social media platform wrote: “Simplicity at Its Best! A man who took 315 ODI and 236 Test wickets, the only Indian fast bowler to cross the 300-wicket mark in ODIs, represented India in four World Cups — 1992, 1996, 1999 & 2003 is standing quietly in a Metro coach — true greatness never needs to make noise.”
Then we also have cricketers who drive Lamborghinis, wear Rolexes and show off their expensive holidays with not half as much achievement in the sporting arena. Surely, that’s one way of living, but it’s not the ideal one. The Srinath example will resonate more with cricket fans.
Srinath, over the years, has been a big proponent of Test cricket and believes the budding cricketers should focus on the longest format to get better at all formats. Recently at an event, Srinath told PTI: "IPL is important, but you need depth in cricket. I mean, Test cricket is a five-day format, which is why it is called the 'mother of all cricket.' A player who plays Test cricket can also find it easier to play T20 cricket. But for someone who only plays T20 cricket, playing Test cricket is not as easy. So, I am saying, stick to Test cricket... the longer version of the game. Alongside that, you can also play T20.”
ABOUT THE AUTHORPrateek SrivastavaPrateek Srivastava is a senior sports journalist having been in the profession for two decades now. He started his print career with the India Today Group and later also worked for the Asian Age. In 2009, sensing the wind of change, he switched to the digital media and joined Mobile ESPN. There, he covered the 2011 Cricket World Cup and 2010 Hockey World Cup as a venue reporter. He did plenty of voice-over work too, over there. After leaving Mobile ESPN, Prateek went on to work for Cricketnext, Gocricket and Cricbuzz. At Gocricket (Times Internet Limited), he covered the 2014 T20 World from Bangladesh. There he also received a team leadership award, given at the end of the month. Prateek has also covered the 2016 T20 World Cup in India, this time working for Sportz Interactive. He also worked for Chinese giants Alibaba over two years and led their ""Short News"" content team at UC Browser. While cricket is Prateek’s expertise, he has also done a lot of golf. In fact, he has covered India’s first two European Tour events back in the late noughties. He has also done extensive writing on football having been associated with the Indian Super League for three seasons. Finally, Prateek is a literature aficionado and swears by Philip Roth and Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and when he doesn’t joke, he is usually quiet and at work.Read More



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