This is the second part of a series of articles narrating the on- and off-court tales of how the India-Pakistan Davis Cup ties have unfolded over the years.
India-Pakistan @ the Davis Cup – Part 2
Table of Contents
The late 1960s marked a tumultuous period in both tennis and the geopolitical relations between India and Pakistan. Tennis underwent a rebranding in 1968 with the advent of the Open Era, which was met with scrutiny. But as time progressed, the elimination of the divide between amateurs and professionals propelled the sport towards greater heights. The competitiveness between the players rose in every tier of the tournament, including the Grand Slams. But there were two nations for whom the word Grand Slam meant something unwanted, worthy of despise.
Pakistan launched a military assault on India in 1965 under the name Operation Grand Slam. It was a retaliation against the previously failed attempt that was Operation Gibraltar. After 48 days, the Pakistani forces succumbed to the Indian army. The Pakistan Tennis Federation has never had any official communication on why their team never participated in the Davis Cup (DC) from 1965 to 1970. Safe to assume that war leaves an impact, oftentimes, a cascading one.
In the second part of this DC series between India and Pakistan, we enter tennis’s revolutionary era – the 1970s. Lamar Hunt did to tennis what Kerry Packer did to cricket. Hunt’s World Championship Tennis (WCT) was a circuit that gave structure to the tennis season, introduced colored clothing, normalized tiebreaks, increased television coverage, facilitated night matches, and staged a year-ending championship. This era also marked the beginning of the end of India’s golden era of tennis. After finishing as runners-up to Australia in the 1966 Davis Cup, India continued to dominate the Eastern Zone till 1969.
When the 1970 Davis Cup draw was announced, the semi-finals of Group B of the Eastern Zone saw the return of a India-Pakistan clash. After 1839 days, not cricket, nor hockey, but it was tennis that would see the two nations lock horns again in the sporting world.
1970, Patna, India
It was India’s turn to host Pakistan. Poona, which hosted the previous tie between the two teams, was going through a transformation as a city to become a metropolis. Amidst all the obvious names that could be thought of, Patna was decided as the final venue.
A state capital since 1912, Patna had a rich tennis heritage before the Second World War. Prominent names like Bill Tilden, Henri Cochet, Ryuki Miki had played on the courts of the New Patna Club. The administrators of this club had also hired Alfred Estrabeau as a coach for Indian tennis players. The list of players that Estrabeau coached say enough about his repute – Henri Cochet, Jean Borotra, Jacques Brugnon, Rene Lacoste, Yvon Petra, and Andres Gimeno.
The late 1960s saw the blossoming of the Rahims from Pakistan. Five of Mir Ahmed Rahim’s kids went on to become National tennis champions. Haroon Rahim, the brother of Zulfiqar Rahim (who had featured in the DC side against India in the 1960s) had created a buzz with his arrival as the youngest player (15-years-old) ever to represent a nation at the DC. By the time he turned 17, he had already featured twice in the quarterfinals of junior Wimbledon.
In the opening rubber of the 1970 tie, Haroon took the first two sets against Mukerjea. But Mukerjea retaliated and forced a decider. At a score of 4-6 5-7 10-8 6-2, Rahim conceded the match for reasons unknown.
The second rubber saw Premji Lall play his final singles match against Pakistan. He defeated Munawar Iqbal 13-11 6-4 6-4. Iqbal would go on to be Pakistan’s mainstay DC player for the remainder of the decade. Lall-Mukerjea, famously known as the Bengal twins would throw the knockout punch in the doubles rubber, defeating Haroon-Munawar 6-4 6-1 6-4.
Munawar Iqbal, who had now spent six years between his first and the latest rubber against India, faced 17-year-old debutant Sashi Menon in the fourth rubber. Iqbal finally scored a win against an Indian opponent by winning the match 8-6 6-1 6-4.
The final rubber saw a match wherein a promising youngster by the name Vijay Amritraj faced a 35-year-old debutant, Mohammed-Arif Elahi. Elahi was the son of Colonel Dr Ilahi Bakshi, who was Mohammad Ali Jinnah’s physician. Jaidip Mukerjea was the grandson of freedom fighter Chittranjan Das. Elahi and Mukerjea were placed in the men’s doubles at Roland Garros. But the year was 1971, and it came as no surprise why the Indo-Pak duo never took to the court. As a result, Arthur Ashe and Marty Riessen got a walkover to the second round. They would eventually win the title.
The match against Vijay was the only DC match that Elahi would feature in. Vijay was leading 7-5 7-5 8-10 5-5. Courtesy of poor archival records, we are unaware why the match was eventually abandoned, leading to Vijay winning the final rubber.
1971, Lahore, Pakistan
It is important to get a chronological understanding of the chaos that South Asia witnessed in 1971. On 25th March 1971, Bangladesh took birth as an independent country in the painstaking mannerism of war. Five days later, India whitewashed Sri Lanka in their DC tie, and Pakistan did the same with Malaysia. As a result, the next fixture was the Eastern Zone Group B final between India and Pakistan.
A month after Bangladesh’s independence, the Indian Chief of the Army Staff received orders from the government to intervene in East Pakistan with the objective of putting an end to the strain that the nation was going through due to the massive influx of refugees. The India-Pakistan tie that was scheduled after three days in Lahore was thus in jeopardy. It was Pakistan who cited ‘political grounds’ as a reason for them giving walkover to India.
While nothing supersedes patriotism, in hindsight, in an ideal world this could have been one of the best India-Pakistan DC clashes. Two of Pakistan’s finest, Haroon and Munwar had upped the ante in their game and the veteran pairing of Lall and Mukerjea had established themselves as an Indian wall that was difficult to breach in DC ties of the Eastern Zone.
The following year, when Malaysia recognized Bangladesh as an independent nation on 31st January 1972, Pakistan once again retaliated on sporting grounds by giving a walkover to Malaysia for the tie that was scheduled to be contested in the first week of April. India too suffered its earliest exit in DC in 1972 since 1960. But that year is often seen as a momentous National season due to the outcomes of the Indian Championships. In doubles Vijay Amritraj and Anand Amritraj won the title, thereby commencing a successful pairing dubbed as ‘The Amritraj Brothers.’ In singles, Vijay defeated the legendary Ramanathan Krishnan, marking the ‘passing of the baton’ moment in Indian tennis.
1973, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia
Pakistan had a two-men side for the 1973 DC. Munawar Iqbal and Syed Saeed Meer. While Iqbal had already proven his prowess, Meer established himself as the fastest Asian server and was rated in the Top 100 rankings of Bud Collins. Both players were the reigning finalists of Pakistan’s national championships and it was hardly a surprise to see them defeat Malaysia and South Vietnam without any extra help. India, who had got a direct entry to the semifinals of the Eastern Zone by virtue of their previous year’s performance, drew Pakistan for the third time in four years.
India was powered by the Amritraj brothers and Chiradip Mukerjea. Meerut-born Saeed Meer suffered a straight sets defeat to Vijay in the first round of the tie that was contested for the first time at a neutral venue. The second rubber between Anand Amritraj and Munawar Iqbal was a clash of hard court national champions of both the nations. Munawar was a much more experienced Davis Cupper, having won six of his nine singles matches. Anand on the other hand had a win-loss of 2-3 in singles. Yet, it was the Indian who won the match such that Iqbal could manage to win only six games in the entire match.
The Amritraj brothers then defeated Iqbal-Meer in the doubles rubber. The fourth rubber saw Iqbal retire in the reverse singles clash with Vijay leading 2-6 6-3 6-4 2-3. Chiradip Mukerjea was sent in for the final rubber against Meer. Meer took the first set, but the match was abandoned later. Chiradip pursued a spotless DC career later. He finished with a win-loss record of 3-0 and 1-0 in singles and doubles respectively. A regular in representing India at the Asian Games, he won the bronze medal with Shyam Minotra in 1974. Later, he would exit the tennis scene to pursue a corporate career.
For Pakistan, it would be unfair to mention a note on how the tennis federation and the tennis fraternity of the sport in the country never cared for its greatest heroes that emerged in the 1960s and the 1970s.
PAKISTAN’S FORCED ERRORS
In the early 1970s, following his recovery from a paralysis attack, Zulfiqar Rahim realized he would never be able to reach a level to compete professionally. He spent six years to train himself as a coach and in 1984, when Munir Pirzada (then secretary of the PTF) invited Rahim to open a tennis academy in Pakistan, Rahim was sent back to the UK as Gen. Rahimudin declined the proposal of a tennis academy run by Zulfiqar. Aghast, Rahim moved to Belgium after selling his tennis academy in UK. It was here, where he trained players like Yana Novotna and Hana Mandlikova.
In 1990, Rahim, now the European representative of PTF, was invited by Pirzada yet again. When Rahim’s efforts helped PTF secure a land for establishing a tennis academy, Pirzada sent him back to Belgium. When Anwer Saifullah gave a seemingly trustworthy proposal to Rahim for running his academy in Pakistan, Rahim returned to Pakistan after selling his academy in Belgium. Upon arrival, Rahim realized that the land was allocated someone else despite a proposal. He was left stranded in Lahore. It was not until 2009, that Rahim got a chance to run his academy on a contractual basis. While there were many unrevealed hurdles along the way, Pakistan’s national champions credit Zulfiqar for his efforts even today.
Syed Saeed Meer’s case is even worse. A passionate teacher, even during his playing days he used to conduct clinics for every kid who could not read, so that they could at least learn the basics of tennis. The author of the ‘Play Tennis in Six Weeks’, Meer’s health followed a fatal course for two years from 2014 to 2016. He suffered a heart attack due to a leak in one of the valves that reduced his heart’s functioning to 30%, was put on ventilator, suffered a hypoglycemic attack, and was out of funds.
Had it not been for a fundraiser campaign run by his daughter, Meer’s condition would have reached unwanted levels. Many players spoke in protest of the PTF’s efforts and raised their voices for showing no concern to its national heroes.
Haroon Rahim was ranked No.34 in the world in singles in 1977, won 12 titles in 1978, and decided to retire in 1979. Some time later, he got married to an American woman. There were several unverified claims of the acceptance of Haroon’s wife into the family. He went through a botched up surgery in the USA, and somewhere around the same time was severely affected mentally due to his twin brother committing suicide. One of his UCLA teammates made him an addict.
By now Haroon had disappeared from the public eye. None of his siblings, family members, or coaches know about his whereabouts even today. While some believe he is in the USA, some others say he joined a cult organization and later travelled to India from Nepal. God forbid, but there is also a school of thought that questions whether he is still alive. The PTF, as always has avoided the public eye.
The India-Pakistan Davis Cup tie witnessed a dormant phase after the 1973 tie. But it never ceased the off-court stories that gave shape to the tennis architecture of both countries.