Wisden obituary
Dattatreya Gajanan Phadkar (Dattu), who died in Madras, following heart surgery, on March 17, 1985, aged 59, was a right-arm medium-paced bowler and a forcing batsman, and, as such, one of India's best all-rounders in the years after the Second World War. He played in 31 Tests between 1947 and 1959, the first of them at Sydney, where he began with an innings of 51 and had bowling figures in Australia's one innings of three for 14 in ten overs. He scored another half-century in his next Test at Melbourne, the first of his two Test centuries (123) in his third at Adelaide, and 56 not out in his fourth, also at Melbourne. After making 115 against England in Calcutta in 1951-52, a match in which he also took four wickets, he had the misfortune to make his one tour of England in 1952, a wet summer when Bedser was at his best and Trueman was an emerging force. Phadkar's best score in that series was 64 in India's second innings at Headingley, after their first four wickets had gone down for no run. Besides England and Australia, Phadkar also toured West Indies (1952-53) and Pakistan (1954-55).

In the Ranji Trophy he played for Maharashtra, Bombay, Railways and Bengal, captaining Bombay for whom he had an especially successful season in 1948-49 with a batting average of 114. The highest of his eight first-class centuries was 217 for Bombay against Maharashtra in 1950-51; his best bowling was seven for 26 against T.N. Pearce's XI at Scarborough in 1952, and his best Test bowling seven for 159 against West Indies at Madras in 1948-49. All told he scored 5,554 runs in first-class cricket (average 38.83) and took 465 wickets (average 22.09). He scored 1,229 runs in Tests (average 32.34) and took 62 wickets (average 36.85). He served at different times as an Indian Test selector and was made an Honorary Life Member of MCC in 1969. Two months before he died he came to the Press Box at Eden Gardens, Calcutta, to inform the Editor of Wisden that he had not been born on December 12, 1925, as in the Almanack, but two days earlier.

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