NEW DELHI, April 15: India’s batting star Sachin Tendulkar will travel to the United States later this month to undergo surgery in his left hand for an undisclosed injury, officials said on Tuesday.

Tendulkar, who turns 30 on April 24, will leave two days later for a six-week US sojourn during which he will also have the surgery.

Tendulkar developed pain in his left hand during the tour of New Zealand late last year, but continued to play and emerged the highest scorer at the recent World Cup with a record aggregate of 673 runs.

He opted out of the ongoing three-nation tournament in Bangladesh and with India not scheduled to play Test cricket till the home series against the Kiwis in October, Tendulkar has enough time to recover from the surgery.

“The pain in the left hand has been bothering Sachin for some time and now the doctors have advised surgery,” Indian cricket board spokesman Amrit Mathur said.

“He may take about four weeks to recover, but we do not have any international engagements in this period.

“Sachin will be fully fit by the time India play next.”

Tendulkar is the world’s leading one-day batsman with a record 12,219 runs and 34 centuries. He also has 8,811 Test runs with 31 hundreds at an average of 57.58.—AFP