Last year Aleem Dar’s wife, Noshiha Dar was not able to see the David Shepherd Trophy won by her husband for few weeks as the ‘Best Umpire’ headed to Bangladesh directly from Bangalore to officiate in the ODIs’ against New Zealand. This year too, he will now head to Sri Lanka directly (to officiate in the 3rd Test against Australia commencing on Friday) from England where he collected the glittering trophy on Monday.
“To enable Dar to remain present at the ICC Award in London, the highest governing body had specifically asked India’s Shavir Tarapore to replace him as a TV umpire in the 2nd Test in Sri Lanka”, the source said to this paper.
“Believe it or not, I had a dream where Aleem was certain to win this trophy, 3rd year in a row”, remarked Ahsan Raza, the ICC umpire on International Panel from Pakistan.
“He rightly deserved this award. He is bound to get an amazing reception when returns to Pakistan. More than 1000 people will gather at the airport to receive him even if his flight is arriving in wee hours”, the Raza added.
“The families of Aleem Dar and Asad Rauf will head for performing Haj next month”, Ahsan Raza informs. “Dar is a very religious man and I have never seen him missing any of the five prayers. He offers prayers five times a day even during match days”, the umpire added.
“The other good quality about Dar is that he never lies”.
Interestingly, Dar has been paying Rs. 5000 every month to the family of the bus driver who lost his life while transporting the match officials from hotel to the Gadaffi Stadium on March 3 in 2008 when terrorists attacked Sri Lankan cricket team. He is likely to show this gesture as long as he is on ICC panel. “He has been also helping the poor people”.
“His one of the sons, Ali at the age of 14 is Hafiz. The term is used by Muslims in modern days for someone who has completely memorised the Quran, the holy book.
Dar played domestic cricket for Allied Bank, Gujranwala Cricket Association, Lahore, and Railways as a right-handed batsmen and was leg-break bowler before becoming an umpire.
Courtesy of The Independent
