Gulam Abbas Moontasir, former India basketball captain and Arjuna awardee, died right here on Tuesday evening after extended sickness. He was 80. An unmistakable presence on the well-known Nagpada Basketball Affiliation courts within the metropolis from the time he picked up the game as a younger boy till a number of years in the past, Moontasir was an outspoken and flamboyant persona. His bodily, aggressive type of basketball created fairly a spark in his enjoying days.
Born in 1942 in Mumbai, Moontasir’s inclination in direction of basketball started after American missionaries launched the sport in Nagpada. He shortly progressed to make an influence with the Nagpada, Railways and Maharashtra state groups.
His India debut got here in an exhibition recreation in opposition to Australia in 1960. Moontasir would go on to captain the nationwide staff within the Asian Basketball Championship in Bangkok in 1969 and 1975. He was a part of the Indian facet on the 1970 Asian Video games which completed sixth after topping the group that additionally had China, Thailand and Malaysia.
The identical 12 months, Moontasir was chosen within the Asian All-Star staff and obtained the Arjuna Award, the primary basketball participant to bag the honour.
His firebrand type on the court docket additionally mirrored off it. Moontasir was suspended for 3 years as a result of frequent run-ins with referees and officers within the nation. Even after his enjoying days, he continued to stay outspoken. Fiercely passionate concerning the recreation, he was commonly seen at matches throughout town.
“We might meet very often on the courts and he would discuss simply basketball. He was an everyday at matches and follow periods until a 12 months or so earlier than the pandemic, earlier than his well being points stopped him from stepping out continuously,” Nizar Ahmed Koya, coach of the state ladies’s basketball staff who has additionally been the top coach at Bombay Scottish for greater than twenty years, mentioned.
“His very best quality was that he spoke his thoughts all the time; being outspoken is my greatest studying from him. He would converse with nice fondness of his ‘jasba (ardour)’ throughout his enjoying days and was unhappy that children lately didn’t fairly present that.”
Moontasir himself did not go too deep into the teaching world; he wrote a e book on basketball and featured in a few Hindi films. He was additionally among the many nation’s sports activities icons who featured within the 1987 ‘Freedom Run’ movie shot to advertise nationwide integration.
“His influence went a lot past Mumbai and Maharashtra basketball, it was nationwide,” Nizar mentioned. “He was a outstanding determine in Nagpada being the basketball nerve of town.”