When Sachin Tendulkar returns from South Africa, it will be a different sort of homecoming for him. For, Mumbai, his beloved hometown, would be eagerly waiting to felicitate this famous son of the soil. It is after a long wait of almost 10 years that the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation ( BMC) is finally decided on felicitating the master blaster for his stupendous achievements in cricket, once he returns from the South African tour.
According to civic sources, Municipal Commissioner Swadhin Kshatriya will soon write a letter to Sachin asking him for his availability after the tour of South Africa. " Mayor Shraddha Jadhav had also sent a letter to Sachin expressing interest to honour him. Earlier, it was not possible to felicitate him due to his extremely busy cricket schedule.
The civic chief Swadhin Kshatriya will now request Sachin to provide dates for arranging the felicitation ceremony once he is back in Mumbai," a civic official said.
According to the official, the BMC has initiated the process of honouring Sachin for his remarkable feats in cricket. The draft of the letter, to be sent to Sachin's residence in Bandra, is ready and awaiting Kshatriya's signature, he added.
Additional Municipal Commissioner Manisha Mhaiskar said, " The municipal commissioner had recently sent Sachin a message congratulating him over his 50th Test century and informed him that the BMC wanted to felicitate him. In reply, Sachin said he would give the dates as soon as he returns from his South Africa tour." Several proposals of Sachin's felicitation have been pending with the civic body for the last 10 years. In 2001, the proposal was put up after Sachin created history by becoming the first batsman to score 10,000 runs in the history of limited overs cricket. In 2005, then Deputy Mayor Arun Dev and BEST Committee chairman Surendra Bagalkar asked BMC to felicitate him for scoring highest number (35) of Test cricket centuries during that period.
Recently, opposition leader Rajhans Singh (Congress) demanded Sachin should be felicitated by the BMC after he became the first batsman in ODI history to score a double century in an innings against South Africa in February. Following his demand, the BMC House passed a proposal to organise a felicitation ceremony for him. In between, Sachin even featured in an advertisement for the BMC's ' save water' campaign, appealing to Mumbaikars to use water judiciously during the water crisis, last summer.
Lamenting the fact that it has taken so long for the BMC to felicitate the master blaster, Rajhans Singh said, " The ruling Shiv Sena has deliberately delayed his felicitation, as Sachin had recently said he is first an Indian and then a Maharashtrian."
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