Think Romania and you immediately conjure up images of Count Dracula from the Gothic novel by Bram Stoker written more than a hundred years ago. Bran Castle, commonly known as Dracula’s Castle,  has become something of a tourist attraction for visitors to Romania, near the Transylvanian city of Brasov, and yet the rest of the country with its stunning natural attractions—the Romanian Riviera on the Black Sea with its hugely varied landscape, the ski resorts, the painted and wooden churches, the beautiful areas around the Danube, mountain caves, the cities with cobblestoned streets, should be attracting more visitors than the ones who traverse countries like Italy, Spain, Greece.

But there is another corner of a foreign field that should be drawing international attention.

Just on the outskirts of Bucharest, in the town of Otopeni is the hub for the introduction and development of the game of cricket to the Romanians. Since its inception in 2009,

Cricket is being taught, played, pushed, and preened to over 1,000 school children. In the meantime with a group of expatriates made up of various nationalities, Indians and Pakistanis being predominant and forming of 8 clubs, ICC conferred Affiliate membership to Romania June 2013! This was quite an achievement given that in this country football is the dominant sport.

For Rangam Mitra, a one-time banker from Calcutta, who decided to settle in Romania, in 1999, supervising a copper manufacturing plant. However, it was his passion for cricket that made him take on the mantle of CEO of Cricket Romania with six founding members, mainly from the Transylvanian Cricket Club.  What a ring to it—the Transylvania Cricket Club! And so, when we met at the historic 200-year old Calcutta Cricket and Football Club, where Mitra had played many a sport, it seemed the perfect venue to ferret out his Romanian romance with cricket.

Mitra teamed up with Romanian Gabriel Marin, who was a professional U-19 basketball player running a successful software company, and who fell in love with cricket where he saw a “competitive sport played with no physical act of aggression directly against the opponent and with a complete respect for players, authority and umpiring”. Cricket Romania came into being as a foundation in 2009 and defined a Mission and Vision Statement that would be an eternal reminder of the ethos and spirit that would drive the introduction of cricket in the country with the early objective of achieving membership of the parent body of cricket – International Cricket Council.  Mitra drew up a business proposal and soon plans and pitches were being laid and their goal was to reach within schools, and the local populace.

Mitra quotes Nick Pink, the Regional Development Manager of ICC, Europe as saying: “The future for European cricket is going to be East Europe”, adding that the countries which play now are Slovenia, Bulgaria, Hungary, Croatia, Russia, Serbia, the Czech Republic. Thus, the cricketing story seems to grow larger apace.

Mitra started out by wanting to promote cricket not just as a sport but as an activity. To develop children’s personalities, respect for authority, integrity, concern and understanding of team mates and opponents. This was to be the foundation for their future thinking on leadership, strategic and tactical thinking.

And so, he has been working on this aspect of the formal development of the "intangibles" to blend in with the physical coaching and development of the game.

The tangibles? It all started when he had heard of the plastic portable pitches that were initially designed for use for the Black community in Soweto, and he promptly went off to England and got one. They then approached Beat All Sports (BAS) equipment manufacturers to get cricketing gear for schools. And Mitra actually flew to Jalandhar and had 100 cricket sets made.

A three-pronged implementation program was put in place subsequently for cricket to take root in Romania. The first objective—to set up as many clubs as possible with cricket playing members has been fulfilled, initially with eight clubs in the cities of Bucharest, Timisoara and Cluj. Second—to launch a simpler form of the game—Kwik Cricket in as many schools as possible.  And the third − to develop facilities and professional support – grounds, academies, coaching and training courses, all quintessential for the development of the game.

Heard of Moara Vlasiei? Possibly not! It is composed of two villages, Căciulaţi and Moara Vlăsiei and is about 20 kilometers from the capital, Bucharest. Its fame till now has been local but it’s carp fishing facilities in the lake are a great attraction. Here Cricket Romania has actually completed work on the development of the first turf square in Eastern and Central Europe, and it is here that they launched the Shamsher Singh Inaugural Tournament, to celebrate the birth of a new cricket ground and to commemorate the death of Mitra’s close friend and supporter of Cricket Romania - Shamsher (Bobby) Singh from Jaipur.  The tournament will now be an annual affair. And away visits to other countries have happened too.  The Continental Cricket Championship hosted in Moara Vlasiei saw five European National teams participating in a four day T20 tournament.

There are courses for umpires, scorers, curators. But most important of all, the introduction of Kwik cricket in schools,  over  30 schools having been presented with a Kwik Cricket  sets , while ICC qualified  coaches have been doing the coaching with over   1,000 children in the loop now.

The Indian presence is significant —most can speak both languages and can interact with larger sections of school children particularly the Indian medical students (there are hundreds of them in Timisoara and Cluj), apart from Pakistani students and professionals, Australians, English and the odd Sri Lankans and South Africans.

Mitra has got the Laws of Cricket sewn up by having the Law translated into Romanian. A website cricketromania.com has been launched and they are also on Facebook. In 2014 the Ministry of Sport of the Romanian Government granted Cricket Romania Federation status, thus, becoming the sole body responsible for the control, management and conduct of cricket in Romania. Once sponsorship comes in, they plan to have the first dedicated Cricket University for students and lovers of cricket.

Perhaps this could be an opportunity for our own cricketers to do their immediate post-retirement CSR, or, for that matter, for corporates with an interest in the country, to come forward.

Meanwhile, for those interested in journeying to Romania, the “Carpathian paradise”, the Romanian Honorary Consul in Calcutta, Mr. Brijen Poddar, is a key person to share information on the country.

Additional Information:

1)      To get in touch with Cricket Romania: contact@cricketromanania.com

2)      To know more about travel to Romania: B.K. Poddar, Hony. Consul for Romania. bkp@rkbk.in

3)      Connectivity: Qatar : Delhi/Doha/Bucharest or Lufthansa: Delhi/Munich/Bucharest

4)      Best time of year to visit: Feb/June; Sept/Nov.

5)       Select cities: Timisoara  - cultural & architectural richness; Cluj: Medieval castles; Brasov: sparkling nightlife when not touring cathedrals; Bucharest—capital city, full of parks, gardens, galleries, museums, stylish cafes; Siblu: famous Christmas market.

6)      Romanian visa required.

Think Romania and you immediately conjure up images of Count Dracula from the Gothic novel by Bram Stoker written more than a hundred years ago. Bran Castle, commonly known as Dracula’s Castle,  has become something of a tourist attraction for visitors to Romania, near the Transylvanian city of Brasov, and yet the