Dream on pause for seven years, India opener Yashasvi’s brother returns to cricket

Tejasvi tells The Indian Express that the phone call that followed the message, after he scored 82 against Baroda, was an emotional one between the two brothers — one a rising star of Indian cricket and the other, a late bloomer given his family circumstances.

In 2012, the Jaiswal brothers, sons of a hardware shop owner in Bhadohi, Uttar Pradesh, moved to Mumbai to become cricketers. They shared the groundsman’s tent at Mumbai’s Azad Maidan, but only one could afford to pursue the sport.

So at 17, Tejasvi quit cricket to keep Yashasvi’s dream of becoming an India cricketer alive. As Yashasvi started breaking records in age-group cricket, the elder brother, who took to working as a salesman in a store selling decorative lights at South Extension in Delhi, would send him pocket money. Tejasvi also got his two elder sisters married.

The Jaiswal family at their residence in Mumbai.

“I also wanted to play cricket, but the financial situation of our family was not good. Yashasvi was doing well… So by the end of 2013, I quit Mumbai and cricket and moved to Delhi, where a relative runs a shop,” he said.

The financial struggle apart, Tejasvi had also faced accusations of age-fraud while playing cricket in Mumbai. “I played one game in the Harris Shield and picked up seven wickets. Then people started saying that I had an age-verification issue. I was benched for a year and a half. Yashasvi was doing extremely well and I didn’t want his prospects to be affected because of me. Anyway, Mumbai was too expensive for both of us. It was getting difficult for both of us to have two meals a day. At that point Jwala sir, Yashasvi’s coach, wasn’t in the picture yet,” Tejasvi said.

Tejasvi eventually moved back home to Bhadohi and now, in his late 20s, cricket was well and firmly on the backburner. “By 2021, my sisters got married and Yashasvi got the IPL contract. Life eased for us after that,” he said.

But Yashasvi wanted his brother to get a second chance.

The plan was to move to Tripura, away from the highly competitive Mumbai circuit. Three years after the move, Tejasvi made his first-class debut against Meghalaya last month. He hadn’t played competitive cricket for seven years — 2014 to 2021 — yet grabbed the opportunity.

“It was destiny. I decided to move to Tripura, enrolled in a college, played local cricket, scored runs, picked wickets and now I am a first-class cricketer,” Tejasvi said.

On Sunday, November 10, Tejasvi made a stopover at Delhi enroute to Jammu, the venue of Tripura’s next Ranji Trophy game against J&K. “Our flight to Jammu (from Delhi) got cancelled. The good thing was that I got time to meet my friends in Delhi. I went back to my old shop. A lot has changed in Delhi as well,” Tejasvi said.

Though Tejasvi has started to make a name for himself, what gives him the greatest joy is when people refer to him as Yashasvi’s elder brother.

“I am so proud of my brother. I am playing cricket again because of my brother. And I am happy when people say ‘woh dekho Yashasvi Jaiswal ka bada bhai ja raha (See, that is Yashasvi’s elder brother).”

Pratyush Raj is a sports journalist with The Indian Express Group and specializes in breaking news stories and conducting in-depth investigative reports for the paper. His passion extends to crafting engaging content for the newspaper’s website. Pratyush takes a keen interest in writing on cricket and hockey. He started his career with the financial daily Business Standard but soon followed his true calling as Times of India’s sports reporter for Punjab in Chandigarh, a job that required extensive travel to states such as Haryana, Himachal Pradesh and Jammu & Kashmir. He has also contributed to the sports coverage of India Today Group. Pratyush’s love for sports blossomed during his upbringing in flood-prone Saharsa, a district in North Bihar, where ‘Cricket Samrat’ was his cherished companion.  … Read More