Cricketer Ritesh Walia: Story of passion, grit & dedication
Amritsar, December 20
Ritesh Walia, who lost a leg at the young age of four years and made into the country’s differently abled cricket team, will be a part of the Indian team in the three-day T-22 cricket match to be held in Agra from December 25.
Born in a middle class family, Ritesh’s hip was badly fractured in an accident when he was four-years old and thereafter his leg stopped working.
A keen follower of cricket, he would watch matches on TV and would try to play along with children in the streets, open spaces and grounds. However, he felt upset when his teammate made fun of him for his limping.
Taking mockery as a challenge, he soon began to practice alone by placing bricks in the streets. Soon his dedication and consistent practice reaped fruits and he became a valuable part of his locality’s team and his better performance silenced everyone.
In 2012-13, he participated in a district-level general cricket matches and bagged the ‘man of the match’ title twice. He came in contact with an Agra resident, Harun Rashid of the Indian Differently Abled Cricket Team, in 2014. He gave a trial in 2015 and was selected.
In 2016, he participated and performed well in an international match held in Agra. He played in international matches in Gujarat and Haryana in 2018, in Agra in 2019, and Nepal and Sharjah in 2020.
Differently abled cricket teams from 90 countries had participated in the Sharjah match. In 2022, he played in Bangladesh, where he took two wickets alone and the country’s team remained runners-up.
He is among the three differently abled cricketers from Punjab in the Indian team. He demanded that the government should provide more help to differently abled sportspersons.
