Renowned cricket coach Tarak Sinha breathes his last after battle with cancer

Renowned cricket coach Tarak Sinha breathed his last on Saturday, November 6 in New Delhi after a prolonged battle with cancer. Recently, the 71-year-old had a multiple organ failure after which he passed away. Sinha contributed to the growth of several cricketers across generations and helped them taste success at the international level.

His long list of students includes the likes of Randhir Singh, Surender Khanna, Raman Lamba, Manoj Prabhakar, Atul Wassan, Ajay Sharma, K. P. Bhaskar, Sanjeev Sharma, Ashish Nehra, Aakash Chopra, Anjum Chopra, Shikhar Dhawan, and Rishabh Pant. Among them, Pant and Dhawan are integral members of the current Indian setup.

Tarak Sinha fifth cricket coach to get Dronacharya Award

He operated at the Sonnet Club, which acted as Delhi’s supply line. Sinha, who’s affectionately known as ‘Ustaad Ji’, had eyes of a hawk and groomed a number of players into global stars. Sinha was also the fifth cricket coach to get the prestigious Dronacharya award.

The other four coaches to get the awards are Sunita Sharma, Ramakant Achrekar, Desh Prem Azad and Gurcharan Singh. Sinha had also coached the Indian women’s cricket team.

Earlier this year in May, Sinha said that Pant, who’s currently playing in the T20 World Cup, used to go to him for advice. The late coach had said that the left-handed Pant made changes in his batting technique only after contacting him. Sinha had also asked Pant to stay humble during his good times.

“I told him a couple of things which he needed to work on because no one is perfect and we all need to work on our game regardless of the fact that how good one may be. I didn’t want to tell him negative things during the IPL but he told me I always have that right and freedom to do so. What else you want from your student,” Sinha was quoted as saying.

“He still consults me as in the past. If you ask him today, he would tell you that whatever changes he needs to make in his batting, he does only after consulting me. It’s a big thing because he is now an established player,” he had said.