In Delhi, judges beat Supreme Court lawyers at cricket

The IPL season has gripped the nation and the upholders of the nation’s law are not above the cricket craze as well. Feroz Shah Kotla stadium recently hosted a rather unusual game, when the country’s top lawyers faced off the judges of various high courts and the Supreme Court in the annual match-up between the Chief Justice of India XI and the Supreme Court Bar Association XI. The flood-lit game saw judges from as far as Chandigarh and Mumbai travel to Delhi to help their colleagues from the city beat the lawyers’ team by 35 runs.
In a friendly game
Ajit Kumar Sinha, vice president of the Supreme Court Bar Association (SCBA) and on-field captain of the SCBA XI, said, “We have this game every year.The idea is to reduce the tensions between the bar and the bench and to have fun together, and what better way to do it than play a game of cricket in the middle of the IPL season?” And there was plenty of camaraderie on offer. As the CJI XI won the toss and chose to bat, the commentator announced, “The CJI XI have elected to bat first.” A member of the lawyers’ team retorted, “More like ordered us to field first.”

So, who won?
Batting first, the CJI XI notched up a monumental 195 off their 20 overs, with Justice Ghughe top-scoring with 53. In response, the SCBA XI never quite got going and only managed 160. Justice Ghughe was named man of the match for his innings. TS Thakur, the chief justice of India, who was present as the chief guest, congratulated ‘his team’ for the win. Senior advocate Pramod Swarup said, “I must have played after decades, but I had fun. The atmosphere is great and it is always a great treat being a part of this game.”