India 35/1 at lunch in 2nd innings, lead South Africa by 106 runs
Visakhapatnam, Oct 5: Indian settled for a 71-run first innings lead after the last two South African wickets added 55 crucial runs to end their innings at 431 all out on fourth day morning of the first Test here on Saturday.
South Africa, resuming the day at 385 for eight, batted for 13.2 overs in the morning and scored valuable 46 runs, courtesy debutant Senuran Muthusamy, who remained unbeaten on 33 off 106, and Kagiso Rabada, who hit three welcome boundaries in his 15-run cameo.
India batted for close to an hour in the morning session and were 35 for one at lunch in 14 overs.
Rohit Sharma (25 of 33) and Cheteshwar Pujara (2 off 20) were in the middle, extending their lead to 106 runs.
Keshav Maharaj dismissed first innings double centurion Mayank Agarwal (7) with a classical left-arm spinner delivery which turned and bounce enough to take the edge for a simple catch at first slip.
The odd ball may be turning sharply and keeping low but the pitch still remains a good one for batting.
India will have to score at a brisk rate to post a secured target for South Africa and give enough time to their bowlers to bowl out the opposition on day five.
The hosts would have been better placed if they did not allow South African tail to get some handy runs in the first hour of play.
The 10th wicket stand between Muthusamy and Rabada fetched 35 runs.
Ravichandran Ashwin (7/145), who picked up his 27th five-wicket haul on Friday, added two more to his tally to end the innings with 349 Test scalps.
Maharaj (9 off 31) was caught in the deep after he tried to hit Ashwin out of the park. The last man to be dismissed was Rabada, who missed a slider from Ashwin to be adjudged leg before wicket.
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Sharad Pawar praised RSS after seeing how it burst fake narrative balloon of LS polls: Fadnavis
Nagpur, Jan 10: Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Friday said NCP (SP) chief Sharad Pawar praised the RSS after realising how the outfit managed to overcome the fake narrative spread by the opposition in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
The opposition had claimed BJP wanted to win 400 seats to change the Constitution and end reservations, a narrative which BJP leaders later claimed hit the party hard.
On Pawar praising the RSS recently, the CM said the MVA was successful in creating a fake narrative during the 2024 Lok Sabha polls.
"When assembly polls were approaching, many people from diverse fields who are inspired by the RSS played their role and burst the balloon of this fake narrative. Sharad Pawar saheb is very intelligent. He would have certainly studied this aspect. He realised that this (RSS) is not a regular political power but a nationalist power. In any competition it is good to praise others," he added.
That is why Pawar may have praised the RSS, Fadnavis said.
Speaking at an interaction with senior editor Vivek Ghalsasi at Late Vilasji Fadnis Jivhala programme here, Fadnavis also said he had asked for organisational work when Eknath Shinde was made chief minister in June 2022, but senior leaders asked him to join the government.
He also said Prime Minister Narendra Modi asked him not to behave like an extra-constitutional authority in the government.
He said the decision to become deputy chief minister on the command of the party leadership earned him a lot of praise from the cadre.
After the massive mandate the ruling alliance received in the 2024 assembly polls, Fadnavis said people and party workers would not have been happy if the CM was not from the BJP.
Shinde himself agreed within minutes that the CM must be from the BJP, which itself got 132 seats and was close to a majority of its own in the 288-member assembly, he added.
On Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray meeting him during the winter sessions of the legislature in Nagpur, Fadnavis said he had announced he would not indulge in politics of revenge after becoming CM and all leaders responded positively to it.
On chances of the NCP (SP) and NCP coming closer or reuniting, Fadnavis said, "If you see the developments that took place from 2019 to 2024, I realised never say never and anything can happen. Uddhav Thackeray goes to some other party and Ajit Pawar comes to us. In politics anything can happen though I am not saying this should happen."
He praised BJP leader Arun Gujarati from whom he learnt patience, which he claimed was an important quality in politics along with the ability to take criticism.
In a lighter vein, he said, "I only get angry when I am hungry. If you see me angry then give me something to eat and my anger will go away."
