Maharashtra government offers to sponsor Pranav Dhanawade

There’s some good news for India’s newest cricketing hero-Pranav Dhanawade. After his mind-boggling knock of 1009*, the Maharashtra government has offered to sponsor his education as well as his cricket coaching.

Maharashtra state education minister Vinod Tawde heaped rich praise on the little sensation for his once-in-a-lifetime knock and stated that he had done the entire nation proud. "Pranav's spectacular performance scoring over 1000 runs and creating a new world record, is indeed a matter of great pride for the entire state and the whole country. We shall offer assistance to Pranav for his further education and cricket coaching," the minister said.

Pranav of KC Gandhi School had earlier scored 1009* in just 323 balls against Arya Gurukul School, a record individual score in any form of cricket. The mammoth knock contained 59 sixes and 129 fours, played at a strike rate of more than 300!

The 15-year-old, whose father is an autorickshaw driver, had resumed at an overnight score of 652* and played with similar mindset and attitude. His team finally declared when the score was 1465, off which Pranav alone had hit 1009.

Dhanawade became the fourth Indian to score 500 or more runs in a single innings after DR Havewalla (515 for Central India Railways, Bombay against St Xavier’s, Baroda in 1953), Chaman Lal (502 not out for Mahendra College, Patiala against Government College, Rupar in 1956-57) and Prithvi Shaw (546 for Rizvi Springfield against Francis D’Assisi in a Harris Shield game in 2013-14).

But the record for the highest individual score in the history of the game will remain Pranav’s as of now, and is unlikely to be ever breached in the near future. For the man himself, it is an incredible achievement considering his humble background and the start of a new dawn in cricket.

For now, the world will take time to digest this improbable feat achieved by Pranav and this could well be another rags-to-riches story for India.