REQUIEM FOR THE WEEPING WILLOW

Beset with multiple problems, Kashmir’s famed bat-making industry is in the woods

- Qaiser Mohammad Ali

IMAGINE a perfectly executed cover drive in a packed stadium—the bat swinging down in a high arc, the sweet crack of bat meeting ball before it races away to the boundary to loud cheers of the spectators. The runs that a cricketer accumulates are as much about his skills as they are about the perfect cricket bat crafted from perfectly mature willow. The scenic hills of Kashmir, where the snow runs deep in winters and the summers are mellow, are home to the Kashmir willow, the tree from which comes some of the best cricket bats in the world, considered on a par with, if not better than, the English willow. And budding cricketers of India walkout to dusty fields wielding bats made of Kashmir willow to hone their skills that would one day perhaps ensure them a place in their state or national teams. International cricketers may prefer bats made of the much lighter English willow, but for junior players it has invariably always been the ubiquitous BDM, SG or SS bats made of home-grown willow.