Statistician Anandji Dossa dies at 98

Anandji Dossa, a cricket historian who was considered the doyen of Indian cricket's scoring and statistics, died in New York on Monday. Dossa was 98. Last year, Dossa along with his wife had moved to the United States of America to be with their daughters.

Dossa, a former cricketer who was a reserve in Mumbai's Ranji Trophy squad but could not break into the side, made an immense contribution to Indian cricket by introducing the culture of cricket scoring and stats. He did live scoring for all major cricket in India for the All India Radio for the first three decades of independent India.

He also groomed a spree of cricket statisticians and scorers. His famous scrapbooks, with newspaper cuttings of every India match from their first Test in 1932 until the 1990s, are an encyclopedia of Indian cricket in itself. He had a habit of noting down minor details in his scrapbook, a technique which has evolved into an integral part of cricket scoring.

Dossa also authored many books, including Duleep - the Man and his Game (co-authored with Vasant Raiji), Cricket Ties: India-Pakistan and Art of Scoring (in Gujarati).

Once he donated most of his collection to the Cricket Club of India, former CCI and BCCI president Raj Singh Dungarpur preserved it by starting the Anandji Dossa Library on the premises of the club.

BCCI secretary Sanjay Patel paid tribute to Dossa, terming his contribution to the game "extraordinary". "An era has ended with the demise of Mr Anandji Dossa. He was one of the game's unsung heroes. His contribution to the sport was extraordinary," Patel said in a release. "He was among those who made cricket and cricketers immortal, by collating and preserving the accounts of their achievements for posterity."