PTI
Karachi, August 11: Hanif Muhammad, the Pak cricket legend and captain who was liked on both sides of the border breathed his last here Thursday after a prolonged battle with cancer. He was 81.
A spokesman for the Aga Khan Hospital, where he was being treated, confirmed that Hanif had passed away. “He was in ICU and on a ventilator for respiratory problems and passed away Thursday,” he informed.
Hanif, had earlier in the day, been declared clinically dead for around six minutes before he was revived back to life. His son Shoaib Muhammad had then announced that his father had passed away. But few minutes later it was clarified that Hanif was still alive.
But after a few hours, Shoaib also confirmed that his father was no more. “He fought hard with his ailments and he was very sick for the last few years since he was diagnosed with lung cancer four years back,” Shoaib said. “Our family is distraught. He was in a lot of pain the last few weeks but didn’t give up, such was his fighting nature,” Shoaib, himself a former Test batsman, said.
Hanif was a member of Pakistan’s first touring Test squad that went to India in 1954-55 and went on to play 55 Tests scoring a memorable 337 runs against the West Indies in 1957-58. It remains the longest innings in Test history.
