Dubai: The Rajasthan Royals team had been most conspicuous in the IPL auction with it’s big purchases, including the costliest player in Ben Stokes, but a young 20-year-old Aryaman Vikram Birla is also catching everyone’s attention.
Aryaman is the son of Kumar Mangalam Birla, a scion of Birla family — one of India’s biggest industrialist families. Though Aryaman went unsold in the first round of the IPL auction held in Bengaluru on Saturday, he got picked in the second round of bidding by Rajasthan for $45,000.
For Aryaman, whose father’s net worth is $12.6 billion (according to Forbes magazine) as chairman of Aditya Birla Group and chancellor of Birla Institute of Technology and Science, price tag is of no consequence but being able to play alongside top cricketers like Australian and team skipper Steve Smith, India vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane and Stokes.
Aryaman preferred to play cricket than spend his time enjoying the luxuries or following his father’s business. He learnt the basics of the game playing in Mumbai from the age of eight and believes that growing up in Mumbai helped him a lot.
In an interview to Indian media earlier, he had even once remarked: “Playing in Mumbai is a great learning process. Growing up with cricketers that I did, I learnt a lot. Slogging it out in the Mumbai nets has been important not only for me, but it is so for every aspiring cricketer. And it’s not something I’ve had to do differently,”
After understanding that he has the skills to grow as a cricketer, he moved to Madhya Pradesh. He first caught attention by cracking 153 runs against Odisha in Indore in October last year during the Under-23 Col CK Nayudu Trophy.
Aryaman wanted to be picked on his merit than by his family name and has worked hard on his game. In the C.K. Nayudu Trophy, he scored 795 runs in six matches from 11 innings at an average of 79.50. Even in the longer version of the game at the junior level, he hit four centuries and a fifty in a stupendous season for Madhya Pradesh.
Aryaman is a left-handed opening batsman and also bowls slow left-arm spin. He made his Ranji Trophy debut last November for Madhya Pradesh against Odisha.
