With the 1968-69 revolution of Pakistan in full swing against a draconian Gen Ayub Khan dictatorship, the Board of Cricket Control in Pakistan (BCCP, now the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB)) decided to invite England.

It was at a time when the England team were in protest themselves, after Apartheid-era South Africa refused to play against Basil D’Oliveira, the mixed-race South African-born cricketer who chose to play for England after he was not allowed to play for the country of his birth. 

The Marylebone Cricket Club (MCC, with England’s cricket affairs now run by the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB)) decided on a tour of Ceylon (now Sri Lanka), India and Pakistan. However, the English decided to skip India after Indian Prime Minister Indira Gandhi refused to set aside £20,000 as a deposit for the tour, according to cricket legend Hanif Muhammad’s autobiography Playing for Pakistan.

News of the uprising in Pakistan had reached the MCC while they were in Sri Lanka and talks of abandoning the tour had already begun. Mark Peel, in his biography of former England captain Colin Cowdrey, The Last Roman, writes that, when the team landed in Karachi at the start of the tour on February 2, 1969, England manager Les Ames and Cowdrey were in discussions with the British deputy high commissioner and the BCCP to reorganise the tour. 

The Karachi Test match between England and Pakistan in 1969 has the dubious distinction of being the first one ever to be called off due to rioting. The melee at the National Stadium saw clashes between spectators, anti-Gen Ayub protesters and the police, and led to the resignation of the military dictator

Since East Pakistan stood in complete revolt against Ayub, the BCCP decided to move matches scheduled in Chittagong and Dhaka to West Pakistan. This move turned out to be fiercely unpopular, and Dhaka was reinstated as the venue for the second Test.

On that decision, vice-captain Tom Graveney’s biographer Andrew Murtagh, writing in Touched by Greatness, quotes Graveney as saying that, “The only reason we went was that the students in Dacca [Dhaka], who had control of the city, threatened to burn down the British consulate if we didn’t come.”

Graveney recalled the army being out in force, buildings alight and gunfire across the cities they were in. Politics was the reason the South Africa tour was cancelled and, in the Pakistan tour, “…the team felt exposed and vulnerable, pawns in a wider political struggle.”

TENSIONS ON AND OFF THE PITCH

President Gen Ayub — also the patron of the BCCP — ever willing to wield the little power he had left, had the first two fixtures rescheduled as four-day affairs, with only the third Test in Karachi scheduled to be played across all five days. There was already the sense that rioters could enter the grounds, and for Ayub, fewer days would mean fewer chances of that.

While off-the-field tensions were high, the dynamic within Pakistan’s Test team did not fare much better either. Hanif Muhammad was unceremoniously removed from his role as captain after only being at the helm for 11 Tests, which included winning a Test series at home against New Zealand.

In his autobiography, Hanif Muhammad made note of the political climate as well. “The political climate in Pakistan wasn’t good either, what with the commotion in the country in general, and political wrangling in the offices of the cricket board on [the] matter of Pakistan captaincy in particular,” he writes.

In his stead, Saeed Ahmed was made captain. This gave the captaincy back to a cricketer from Punjab, with Javed Burki — whose father Wajid Ali Khan Burki held various ministries under Ayub — having led Pakistan before Hanif. 

“A decade of army rule in Pakistan had taken its toll and the underlying resentment in both the East and West wings of the country had resulted in violent demonstrations,” observed Hanif in his book. “These continued while we were playing against the touring team.”

POLITICAL PICKS

After three tour matches in Bahawalpur, Faisalabad and Sahiwal, the England team arrived in Lahore for the first Test. This match was not without incident, and featured regular pitch invasions and fighting in the stands.

Aftab Gul, a well-known student leader, was included in the Lahore Test, which was seen as a political move to pacify spectators, and he had to repeatedly go to the stands to calm those in the stadium. 

Basil D’Oliveira, in his autobiography Time to Declare, mentions meeting Aftab Gul at a reception before the first Test at Lahore. D’Oliveira asked Gul if the Pakistan side had been picked yet, to which Gul replied, “No, but I know I’m playing. If I don’t play, there’s no Test match.”

D’Oliveira, however, did not mind much, writing later, “We didn’t mind his selection, because he wasn’t much of a batsman.”

Similarly, for the second Test in Dhaka, local Niaz Ahmed was selected. At Dhaka, England players recall playing at the mercy of a swarm of student protestors, since the army and local law enforcement were nowhere to be seen.

After a reception held by the British ambassador two nights before the Test, any Britishers in the area were air-lifted out of Dhaka due to the threat of civil disorder. Ames rang London for advice, who left it to him to decide whether the Test was to be held. According to Cowdrey, Ames decided to play on — an unpopular decision.

Though the Test ended in a draw, D’Oliveira played a rescuing innings of 114 not out in the first innings, with just the England tail for company, after the visitors were reduced to 130-7. With the political pressure and uncertainty of the Test being scheduled, dropped, and then reinstated, Dhaka was unable to prepare a proper Test pitch. Early on, the rolled mud began to break up with holes, making it a difficult pitch to bat on.

BATTLING IT OUT IN KARACHI

When the England team arrived in Karachi, the situation in the city had further deteriorated from when they had first arrived for the tour. Cowdrey, Graveney and Ames met with the BCCP to discuss security for the Test, with the Pakistani board assuring security.

Graveney, however, having witnessed events in Lahore and Dhaka, wasn’t convinced and fell out with his captain and manager in a heated exchange after the meeting, where he made it clear that he felt the tour had to be abandoned. 

The Karachi Test began with two days of England batting, leading to their scoring 412-6. On day one, England opener Colin Milburn — who had just flown into Pakistan the week prior from Australia — scored 137 not out. Three hundred spectators descended on the pitch to congratulate him, on which Graveney says, “It was quite frightening. You never knew what some lunatic might do. I had to wade in with my bat flailing to get them off him. That was my training — to run round Colin!” 

However, soon after the ground had been cleared of the spectators, 50 Karachi cricketers walked out of the enclosure, protesting against the BCCP’s sacking of Hanif Muhammad as captain. 

Hanif writes that banners saying “We want Hanif as captain” were seen, and that the Karachi crowd was also charged from hearing abuse over radio against Hanif and his brother Mushtaq during the Lahore Test. As the cricketers circled the ground, hundreds more joined them and the players were forced off the field.

On day two, England resumed from 226-1 overnight, between six pitch invasions and a mob fight near the dressing room just before the close of play. Graveney, at the age of 41, scored 105, his eleventh and last Test ton, but this milestone led to clashes between spectators and police, and the crowd demanded that all police be removed.

While this demand was met, spectators then blocked the way from the pavilion to the pitch, because of which Ames refused to let Allan Knott and John Snow go to the crease for the third session, until the crowd was dispersed. 

During the first session of the third day, when English had added 90 runs to their overnight total for the loss of one more wicket, is when The New York Times reports, “A mob of about 600 students swarmed on to the field… The demonstrators hurled wooden chairs and six-foot-long benches into the guest seats, smashing furniture and sending spectators, including women, running for safety.”

PITCH INVASIONS GALORE

Earlier that morning, news had already come to the England players that a leading anti-Ayub leader had starved himself to death, which made many feel that the inevitable was bound to happen. A separate group had also entered the ground attacking the stands.

Reportedly, with Ayub himself in attendance at the ground, news of an abandoned Test with the president in attendance would garner wide coverage. Armed troops and riot police charged against the mob, and students and spectators fought with each other in the stands as well. 

Foreign correspondents and members of both teams had to be taken out of the National Stadium Karachi (NSK) — now known as National Bank Cricket Arena — in private cars and what was available. Meanwhile, England players were on a bus that had its windows broken, with players lying on the bus floor for cover.

Subsequently, marquees and sections of the ground were set on fire soon after the match was abandoned, and just as the visitors were taken to their hotel, arrangements were made for them to fly back to London that very night.

Dismally for the MCC, the flight landed at London Heathrow four hours late, and later a crowd of 200 people waiting on other passengers had to be cleared so that the team could make its way out. 

Shortly after the fiasco, Les Ames remained diplomatic, defending the MCC’s decision to tour Pakistan, by saying that when the tour was first organised in November 1968, the British high commissioner was not aware of the internal situation of the host country. 

Ames was also adamant that the decision to call off the Test was not made by him, but by Fida Hassan, the president of the BCCP at the time, who was also a federal minister for Ayub and an honorary member of the MCC in 1965. Graveney recalls it as being a collective decision to get everyone out as soon as possible.

Hassan himself was quoted by The Guardian as saying, “There is nothing else we can do, but abandon the match. I am very sorry, but we have no alternative after these crowd scenes today.”

The MCC could then leave Pakistan with a clear conscience, knowing that they had listened to the advice of the BCCP all the way till the abandonment, despite growing fears and resentment from its own players. 

A DUBIOUS DISTINCTION

The NSK Test ended up with the dubious distinction of being the first known Test that was called off due to rioting. Memory of the riots were still fresh in 1975 when, in the second Test between Pakistan and the West Indies — which had a reported attendance of 60,000 — riots broke out when around 40 spectators ran in to congratulate the 22-year-old Wasim Raja on his maiden Test century.

Police had to use tear gas to disperse the thousands that came in after who had pulled down the steel-mesh fencing, and attacked police with chairs and sticks. However, the Test resumed. 

Tensions were also high on the eve of another England vs Pakistan Test at Karachi in 1978. Mushtaq Muhammad, Zaheer Abbas and Imran Khan, who had been playing the rogue World Series Cricket under Australian Kerry Packer, were being scapegoated by the BCCP, and sports journalist Henry Blofeld, in his pre-match report for The Guardian, mentioned that a riot was not out of the question, if the three players were not selected, making particular reference to the riot in 1969. 

In any case, after the abandoned Karachi Test, Gen Ayub was to last in office only for 19 more days, resigning in disgrace in March 1969, after months of student protests and divisions between his own armed forces. During the Test itself, it was reported that Ayub was “desperately anxious to resign as head of state immediately”, after holding a conference with opposition leaders scheduled for March 10.

When asked by members of his Convention Muslim League — a party Ayub created after dissolving the Muslim League — if he was going to hold a referendum, he reportedly replied, “Don’t you think what is happening in the streets of this city is a referendum?” 

LEFT HANGING

While Ayub lost a country, another man was also out of luck in terms of cricket. England wicketkeeper Allan Knott was stranded in the nineties when the rioters came in during the Karachi Test. He recalls in his autobiography that, on 96, he had just been beaten by a googly from Mushtaq Muhammad, with the ball going over the top of the wicket and also beating Wasim Bari behind the stumps. As he was getting ready to face the next ball, David Brown at the other end called him off.

D’Oliveira’s recollection is slightly more comical. According to his biography, “Knotty was begging Intikhab [Alam] to toss up a dolly so he could get his century” and that Brown shouted “I’m off”, leaving Knott to sprint back as well.

It would be another two years before Knott could get to his maiden Test century, in March 1971. His delayed century against Pakistan came soon after, in June of that year. 

Notable also was a debutant in this game, yet events of the day swayed the attention of the BCCP. The incomparable Sarfaraz Nawaz was to not get his next Test for another three years. Though wicketless in that innings on a typical Karachi pitch, Sarfaraz “impressed with his length and movement through the air” on a deck where “the bowlers made little impression.” 

Nawaz and Pakistan had to wait until 1972 before he would assume the leadership of Pakistan’s pace battery.

Saeed Husain is Managing Editor of Folio Books. X: @saeedhusain72

Published in Dawn, EOS, January 5th, 2025