The Greatest is gone

My grandfather made all three of us granddaughters read ‘The Hindu’ newspaper from top to bottom. We may not have followed his advice entirely, but we did end up finding interest in specific columns and sections of the newspaper. In a way, everything I read and write today could be traced back to my newspaper habit.

One of the columns that made me begging for more was the ‘Comment’ section in the Sports Edition. The man who authored it was Nirmal Shekar — a writer beyond compare whose stronghold on the English language left me speechless. The truth was, I only watched cricket and had a…