When I first met Piyush Pandey — ‘Woh kuch khaas tha’

The early days after retiring from professional cricket can feel strangely empty. No morning nets, no travel bags packed for the next match, no team meetings. Silence replaces the sounds of leather on willow, and applause turns into the hum of ceiling fans in familiar rooms.

In the mid-90s, my days drifted like that. Evenings were predictable — squash or swimming at Bombay Gymkhana, followed by a few beers at the bar. Life seemed uneventful. But sometimes, boredom is just life waiting to introduce you to extraordinary people.

That’s when I met Piyush Pandey and Sonal Dabral.

We would swim, sit by the poolside, talk cricket, advertising, and life — and we laughed a lot. Piyush was different. He looked at the world with a colourful lens. His stories wandered from the dunes of Jaisalmer to a casual observation during an inter-advertising agency cricket match — an observation that would eventually become Cadbury’s iconic “Kuch Khaas Hai” campaign.

A creative wicketkeeper

What fascinated me most was how uncomplicated his creativity was. Cricket had taught him to observe. And being a wicketkeeper, he had mastered it early —watching batsmen, studying fielders, reading rhythms of play. Except, I realised, he wasn’t only observing the game. From behind the stumps, he was also observing people — consumers, emotions, habits. Everything his brands would one day need.

Tea tasting was his first job. Destiny, thankfully, rerouted him. With his instincts and imagination, tea rooms and smoky colonial bars of old Calcutta clubs would never have been enough. Advertising was where he belonged.

Words came naturally to him — not just spoken, but delivered with timing, warmth, and precision. He started calling me “Haathgaadi”. At first, I thought it was a jibe. Then he explained — slow, careful, assured, committed. Suddenly, that name became less of a nickname and more of a compliment.

Pandey, Lal and Maharaja Theory

Piyush was a close friend of Arun Lal — the gritty Test cricketer who left St Stephen’s, Delhi, for Calcutta and became the face of Bengal cricket. Piyush would speak romantically — and knowingly — about the influence of princely states in shaping Indian cricket. Patrons, palaces, and princes building cricketing legacies.

Back then, it sounded like a story from another era. Now, it feels like he had seen the future. The Maharajas had, unknowingly, sown the earliest seeds of what we today call the IPL. Piyush already knew where fame, money and cricket were heading.

Fame in a bagru shirt

Fame sat lightly on him. He wore it as casually as he dressed — a pack of Classic cigarettes from ITC, a loose bagru vegetable-dyed shirt, and worn-out jeans. That was his uniform. From there, he could hold his own with a boardroom CEO — or sing “Dhoondo Dhoondo Re Saajana” to a batsman fishing outside off-stump.

He sold dreams in advertising, but he never lost touch with reality. Observation was his habit. Humour was his language. Emotion was his product. Sitting in an office selling dreams, he still stayed connected to the dust, sweat, and simplicity of the real India.

Maybe that’s why we connected.

Maybe that’s why “Haathgaadi” didn’t feel like an insult anymore.

It felt real. Rustic. Honest.

Just like him.