Pujara's wife Puja didn't tell him about his father's heart condition when he was making big runs in Australia

Indian Express

29-04-2025

A couple of years ago, after India's 2023 World Test Championship final loss to Australia, their perpetual No.3 Cheteshwar Pujara got the call that most cricketers in their mid-30s dread. It was the chief selector on line informing him that they wanted a younger Test side and he wasn't part of it. Despite his 100-plus Tests, unlike other equally out-of-form seniors, he didn't get the long rope. Pujara, a veteran of many setbacks and comebacks, was hurt. True to his temperament, he went silent.
But not his wife, Puja, a close witness and sherpa to Cheteshwar's arduous cricketing journey. She was outraged, her anger exploded into pithy rhetorical questions: Why was Cheteshwar expected to shoulder the blame for India's defeat? Why should you put yourself through so much scrutiny? Why don't you call it quits? Both knew, there were no answers.
Then Puja said something that would go on to be the theme of a book she would pursue in the days to come: 'You are not the only one who is going through these highs and lows. We, as your family, are equally affected by it.'
Two years later, the one-of-a-kind sports book — 'The diary of a cricketer's wife' (HarperCollins) — is out and the scene at the Pujara household when he got dropped finds space on its pages. The cover calls the book 'A very unusual memoir' but there is a case for adding 'honest' to the tag line.
Sporting arenas have been insensitive in dismissing the partners of players as mere props. Often the support system and bouncing board of sporting superstars, the Wives and Girlfriends go by a rather reductive and dismissive collective noun – WAGs.
On match days, as they sit bunched in VVIP stadium boxes, they are expected to give the game situation appropriate expressions. In the grand cinema called Indian cricket, they have a bit part but no dialogues. Finally, there is a book that records the all-important female voice of men's cricket.
The Pujaras are keen to talk about the book. Puja says the role of wives, and other family members, rarely gets discussed in detail. 'We are always given this glamorous role when that is not the case. Behind the smiles and cheering in the stadium, there are 20,000 thoughts in our head. They keep switching the cameras to the spouses. And that's where the story ends, right? Nobody follows up or nobody hears from the spouse also much after that,' she tells The Indian Express.
Puja's book introduces readers to a world where the men of the house are perpetually absent. It's a peek into the lives of women who, at times, have a lonely existence with only fear and anxiety for company.
While the cricketers get hailed as gladiators, the wives are left to deal with the daily battles of raising kids and being the first, and at times, the only responders, to medical emergencies of elders. Most times, they don't even have the option of sharing their problems with their cricketer partners. What if it disturbs the men burdened with unreasonable expectations of a cricket-crazy nation?
That was the reason, according to the book, why Puja hid from her husband the news about his father's heart condition while he was in the middle of that 2018-2019 historic series in Australia. She was holding the fort at home when Cheteshwar with three hundreds in four Test matches was conquering Australia — India's first-ever series win Down Under.
With the second Test at Perth to start in a few hours, it was 2.30 am at the Pujara household in Rajkot. At that ungodly hour, Puja's phone rang. Next to her bed was her daughter, in the cradle yet to celebrate her first birthday.
It was her father-in-law calling from the first-floor of their home. He had a heart condition and was now suddenly feeling uneasy. Puja called Cheteshwar's cricketer-friend Kuldeep. She also reached out to his siblings and other relatives to take care of her daughter while she headed to the hospital. The doctor would later recommend 'a heart ablation procedure'.
Sleepless and stressed, she got the usual pre-match call from Cheteshwar — a ritual they had followed for years. Puja had to act normal. The book captures that delicate moment of deception wonderfully. 'The second Test was beginning that very morning, so I freshened up, took a short nap and woke up in time to wish Cheteshwar luck for the match. I carefully omitted all mention of the events of the previous night… 'How's the hamstring,' I asked casually. 'Fine,' he answered, insouciantly. 'Best of luck for the match,' I wished him, with a spurious attempt at jollity. 'Thanks,' he replied, distractedly, his mind already on the game ahead,' Puja writes.
After the game, Cheteshwar was informed about his father's condition and the impending operation in Mumbai. That date clashed with the final Test in Sydney. When Puja was on the flight to Mumbai with her father-in-law, Cheteshwar was fighting the Aussie bowlers. When she reached the hospital, her husband had crossed a hundred.
The book says that while in the hospital lift, Puja saw attendants watching the India-Australia game on their mobile phones. Little did they know that the batsman they were following diligently had their hospital on his mind. When the operation ended, the day's play was over. Cheteshwar was unbeaten on 130. Next day, he ended up scoring 193. Cheteshwar had played the path-breaker, the Aussie bastion had fallen.
Puja awaited the homecoming of the national hero but was once again stumped by cricket's uncertainties. She describes in the book another of those long-distance conversations with her famous husband. 'A vacation? A teeny-weeny break — as a treat for all the sleepless nights I had endured? These dreams lasted till Cheteshwar's next phone call. He had already booked his tickets to travel to Kanpur for Saurashtra's quarter-final game,' Puja writes.
That wasn't new to Puja. Cheteshwar had missed the birth of his daughter because of another Ranji game previously.
Not a regular member of the India team, Cheteshwar tries his best these days to compensate for his long absences. He drops his daughter to school and in the days ahead will take a 'back seat' if Puja wants to start a business or any other new venture.
Speaking to this newspaper, Puja refers to Cheteshwar's acknowledgment of the role she has played in his career and describes the joy of 'being part of someone equally' and how that has made 'everything worth it'.
She goes back to the 2018-19 series in Australia to make her point. 'Though I did not travel to Australia, just those raw emotions of fans gives you warmth and love. No matter how small or big a part you have played, it just feels so, so special. I feel like it's my victory as well. The warmth you see everywhere you travel, it just feels there's so much gratitude,' she says.