Donning A Myriad of Roles Effortlessly – Harimohan P

 

Harimohan Paruvu, an engineer by education, cricketer and a published author by passion, shares his interesting and evocative professional and personal journey during a freewheeling chat. The former Ranji cricketer has five books and a film-based on his first novel to his name along with his regular contributions as a columnist for Edex Live, for the New Indian Express.

1. Tell us a bit about your childhood and what was it like to have elder sisters around while growing up?

I was born in Hyderabad. My father was a civil engineer in the state Roads and Buildings department. He retired as Chief Engineer, National Highways and was a committed professional, a gentle, artistic man from a humble background, the first graduate in his family. My mother was a worldly wise, sensible and grounded person who trained to be a teacher after school. But she never worked being busy managing home with six children and frequent transfers across the state.

 

I have four older sisters and one younger brother. The gap between my oldest sister and younger brother is almost 17 years, so we had no shortage of mature and gentle guidance from four concerned and caring sisters. Each of them taught us something –my oldest sister Ashwini’s innocent and romantic view of life embellished with simple values built around the family, my second sister Dr. Nalini’s early introduction to reading books and attitude of challenging status quo, my third sister Mythily’s thoughtful, caring and deeply-rooted family values and my youngest sister Swarajya Lakshmi’s creativity, resilience, and pragmatism. All of them studied well, my oldest sister is a science graduate, second sister a doctor with an MD in pathology, third sister a Masters in commerce and the fourth sister an electrical engineer from the then Regional Engineering College, Warangal. My brother and I grew up fully pampered by all their attentions. But through it all my younger brother Ram and I, separated by two and a half years, remained the best of friends, playing, studying, and quarreling.

 

2. Were you always into sports? More specifically into cricket? Or was it something you happened to develop a liking for?

 

I was always attracted to sports games. We grew up playing all sorts of games – soccer, table tennis, shuttle badminton, kabaddi, kho kho - but as I grew older cricket took over. Most of my early cricket was gully cricket with my brother and a few friends but I could play for hours and hours, at times alone, with the wall for company. I was fully drawn into cricket by the time I was eleven or twelve.

 

3. How did Ranji happen? Can you tell us more about your Ranji stint?

It was a very interesting journey, one that in retrospect shows how when you’re ready things happen, doors open. After all those years of gully cricket and wall cricket, I joined All Saints High School in Hyderabad, a school with a rich cricketing tradition in Hyderabad with players like Azharuddin, Venkatapathi Raju and Noel David going on to represent the country, and a host of first-class cricketers.  All Saints had a structured cricket regime, with excellent facilities, coaches, players representing the state and Sunday league cricket. I went for cricket selections in my final year at school and got selected. The same year I represented the state at the Under 15 leveland the South Zone under 15. I attended a one month BCCI camp for the South Zone Under 15s under Mr. Rehmat Baig, a top-notch cricket coach who still coaches to this day. That summer ironed out many of my rough edges and made me a much better cricketer.

My next break was playing for the Marredpally Cricket Club led by former test cricketer Mr. ML Jaisimha thanks to my friend Vidyuth Jaisimha putting in a word. That experience was worth its weight in gold because I learned so much by just watching Mr. Jaisimha.

Under his skilful captaincy and mentoring my performances improved and I played Under 19, Under 22 and Under 25 levels in the next two years, when in my 12^th.  The consistent run of good performances continued and I was selected to play Ranji Trophy for Hyderabad in 1986, when I was studying my secondyear at engineering. I got one and four wickets on debut against Andhra which was a decent start. I played only seven matches and got 12 wickets with two four wicket hauls. I was dropped in my second year, the year when Hyderabad won the Ranji trophy and though did not play the finals, we were all felicitated since we contributed to the entire campaign. It is something I am very proud of.

The year I was dropped from the Ranji side in my third year of engineering, I felt I had to choose between cricket and my academic pursuit. My father had passed away by then. I felt it was too much of an effort for too little (we got paid 300 bucks for a Ranji match then) and dropped cricket. I continued playing for the University though and we won the University and South Zone university titles later.

But today I would have done it differently if I could, I would have worked on my shortcomings and made a comeback into the Ranji side and then, quit on my terms. I should have gone out on a high. In fact another great influence on me, Mr Sampath, who was our Ranji coach, came all the way to our college to tell me not to get disheartened and instead gave him a year to train me. ‘I’ll make you play for India,’ he promised. Sadly, I took the easy route out. I decided not to make that same mistake when I chose to write later on.

 

4. From a finance professional, with an MBA degree, to a published author and columnist, how was that journey?

I always enjoyed writing because it allowed me to clarify conflicting thoughts in my head. In fact I think I sailed through most of myeducation because of my proficiency in English. After my MBA I did the corporate tour as we were all expected to, and after a decade of working in sales, marketing and finance jobs, I decided to quit and write.

However, I had been writing for newspapers through my ten year stint at the bank. Even before I quit, I took a four month sabbatical and wrote every day to test myself. I would write an article during the day, type and edit it and complete it by the end of a 10-12 hour workday. I enjoyed the process and could easily sustain it over four months. That’s when I realised I could do it full time. Apart from articles for newspapers I also wrote my first novel while still working, which never got published by the way. It gave me the confidence that I could sustain the process and do something with it. That was when I decided to quit even without a publishing offer in hand.

 

5. You started off your career with the corporate sector, banking, to be precise. Has it had any impact on your writing and the workshops you conduct?

As they say, the dots connect and I believe there is nothing that we do which goes wasted. The only condition to connect it all up is to give 100% in whatever you are doing. My engineering taught me analytical skills, to be precise and economical, my banking taught me to pay attention to detail and tell the story well, my management degree gave me a perspective into how businesses work and are organized.

 

6. What was the main catalyst for your first book, The Men Within?

The fact that there was no cricket fiction when I was young was the catalyst. I thought I would write a story that young school kids in India could relate to, read and enjoy. I decided to give enough cricketing insights about how things work when a team wants to win. I never expected that adults would connect to the story and that people would find personal excellence, team work and leadership stories from it. Nor did I imagine that someone would make a movie out of it (my brother Ram Mohan, an electronics engineer and an IIM’ Ahmedabad alumnus, who turned a film producer bought the rights and made a Telugu film ‘Golconda High School’ based on the book). When the book first got published in 2007, Rajan Bala, a senior and respected journalist, who was the first to review the book, mentioned that it was perhaps the first cricket fiction in Indian Writing in English. That surprised me.

 

7. Have you ever given a thought to writing a book aimed at being made into a film or a web series?

I am currently writing a short story/novella which I think may lend itself to a film or web series. I am more comfortable writing stories so I think I’ll stick to the story format for now.

 

8.  A number of corporate and banking sector professionals seem to have transitioned to writing and have gone on to be some of the best-selling authors in the recent past. What do you think is this enigmatic connection between the corporate sector and writing?

The corporate sector is seen as a measure of one’s success so it is but natural that after formal education, most young professionals first focus on proving themselves to the world, and then venturing into ‘hobbies’ or ‘passions’. As far as the connection with banking professionals is concerned, it perhaps to do with the nature of the job, which involves a lot of writing engaging reports which is storytelling in a way. There may be other reasons too as the commonality of the mental makeup between a person who chooses a bank job and prefers writing, as opposed to let’s say, acting.

 

9.  Come to think about it, writing is an art as well as a science too. What is your take on this?

There are both aspects –art and science - to almost anything I guess and certainly to writing. I see the science in the structure, deconstruction of the craft, the systematic build up which helps a writer deliver a fairly standardized product. But it takes courage or great passion to let go and express oneself forming one’s own structure, breaking all norms and listening only to one’s soul as one expresses. Stuff where one is not really concerned about the audience, where all one is concerned about is that it’s making sense to her. Stuff that makes our hearts soar. We all have those moments. A few live their lives like that. It’s heroic stuff.

 

10. You have been a part of a Marriage anthology – ‘Knot For Keeps’, which involved several prominent personalities too. How was that experience of collaborating with eminent personalities from different fields?

A. That was a fun project because it gave me a chance to write about my marriage. We didn’t really collaborate with another – we all wrote our pieces and submitted them and the editor Ms. Sathya Saran put it all together.

 

11.  Your fourth book ‘This Way is Better Dad’ – Did you write it consciously with the thought that you want to write something for her? What was her reaction after the book was published?

A. It was not written ‘keeping her in mind’ – it was entirely reproduced from what she actually said or did. When she was about three years old or so (now she is almost thirteen), I found her responses to life very interesting and captured the more interesting incidents on my blog as they happened. I would wonder how I would have reacted in similar situations and found that as a child, given her context and understanding of the world, she was doing so manythings far more efficiently than I was. Hence the title ‘This way is easier dad’. In fact I would confirm with her so what I was writing was not misrepresenting what she thought or said. She corrected me a few times. Her blogs were liked by some readers and someone suggested that it could work as abook. I made a proposal with a lot of artistic help from my friend Sagar. My publisher liked it and that’s how it became a book. It is told exactly as it happened.

 

12. Your wife Shobha, and your daughter, have been the witnesses to your professional journey and surely, they have been a great support. Would you like to elaborate on how they have been the pillars of strength to your donning so many different professional roles?

A. I would not have been able to take off from a corporate career and dive into seeming nothingness if it had not been for Shobha’s steadfast support and belief that we have one life and we must do what we love. We have lived pretty unconventional lives since – she also quit the corporate career and went into therapy and counseling – a journey of self discovery, which she continues. I have done several of her programs and learned much and continue to do so. I incorporate some of the ideas into my programs or writings. Anjali continues to inspire me and give me lots of joy, wonder, and purpose. I still learn a lot from her.

 

13.  Could you share a memory with us from your Ranji days which is still as fresh in your mind as the time it happened?

A. My spell on debut against Andhraat Sirpur Kagaznagar where I got four wickets, was one of the best spells I ever bowled – one where I could make the ball talk as they say. One other memory was drawing a false shot from the great GR Vishwanath in a match against Karnataka and getting him to edge to slip when he was on 93 and seeing him being put down by my teammate Khalid Abdul Quayyum. He went on to score 160 odd but I wish I had his wicket to my name.

14.   As a person who has played at the Ranji level and seen players from the grass roots come up and make a mark from themselves, how critical do you feel it is to hone talent from small towns and villages? 

A. It’s very important because they constitute a large portion of the pool of talent we have. It’s been proved beyond doubt that they have as much or even more commitment, capacity to hard work and resilience as cricketers from urban areas. With TV and internet they have all worked in some way or other on their games, maybe with more honesty and commitment than some privileged kid, and we just need to develop structures to bring more and more of these talented cricketers into the main stream. We are sitting on a gold mine of talent that way.

 

15. You were the Chief Selector for the Hyderabad Cricket Association for a year in 2012. How was the experience?

A. I did a year’s stint as Chairman of the Senior Selection Committee for the Hyderabad Cricket Association. Though I did only one yearit was a great learning experience. I felt committees should be given a minimum of three years – which was what was done previously.

One thing I noticed was that we are quick to discard talent after they have reached a certain level instead of preserving talent and working on them on the four areas of skill, physical fitness, mental and emotional ability, and improving them further. The fact that they have made it to the top of the pyramid is proof that they should be kept in a pool of 30 in the respective age group for a couple of years and frequently assessed for progress. Dropping them off the radar is a criminal waste.

Another interesting aspect was seeing parents and coaches getting highly involved in the process and pushing for selection.Many times selectors also would speak of giving someone a ‘chance’. To me the purpose of selection is clear, to make the best team that will go and win the trophy. Now age, promise etc do not matter as long as they fit into the scheme of things and propel the team towards victory. All effort should be towards making a cohesive unit that can play together as one to get the best possible results.

One common argument that comes up in selection is about performance versus talent or promise. I found that we can never measure players on numbers alone because stats can indicate but they also hide a lot. To me a player who has performed under pressure, and contributed to winning a match or saving a match, is far more important than those who perform twice as much in inconsequential games and fail in big ones. In one word, we look for character, a resilience of spirit to fight it out, to go through discomfort and stand. A person who has character is also a team player, looks for greater glory of the team than their own.

Not everyone gets selected and I always felt that the players should realise that and enjoy the process. If they keep improving through conscious work on their abilities they will eventually break in. That’s the process of preparation and they must realise that; not look for selection with one good season. You must be consistent over several seasons against all kinds of opposition. That’s what one must look to be, to bring irreplaceable value to the side. Not merely squeeze into the last spot by a whisker thanks to someone putting in a good word for you.

 

16. Words of advice for aspiring cricketers and writers? Or in fact, for anyone wanting to make their work count?

Whatever field you choose, understand that everything can be learned and bettered. Do not believe in ideas that your potential and intelligence is fixed or limited. There are ways of working purposefully, with good teachers and coaches, putting in deliberate effort and going past the average. The journey should always be towards getting better in the long run by sharpening the process of learning. You must understand that your performances exactly reflect your preparation - skill, physical, mental and even spiritual.

But you must enjoy the process irrespective of how soon or how late you get your success. Like they say, the journey is the way. Don’t get too attached with ‘certain’ results because it actually gets in the way. Use results as feedback and come back better. Books like ‘Mindset’, ‘Peak’ and ‘The Power of Full Engagement’ can be a good starting point for them to read and temper their approach.

 

 17. What can we look forward to from you? A Book, anthology, or a script for a film?

I am currently working on a short story/novella based on a real life incident which I have fictionalized. It is in the social drama mould which might lend itself for film or a web series. During the lockdown, I also completed the first draft of a collection of 12 short cricket stories. One of the stories is novella length, and based on a true story, an Inter University campaign that we won in 1990. The other 11 stories are stories of interesting games we played, fictionalized, or stories with angles like parents and their excessive involvement, pressure on children to perform, selections.