The written word on Pakistan cricket is not easy to find. If you walk into a typical bookshop in one of the major international cricket cities, say London or Sydney, there will be nothing on Pakistani cricket or cricketers. Instead, you will find the cricket bookshelves dominated by authors from England and Australia, with a smattering from South Africa, West Indies, and India. This neglect is certainly not in keeping with Pakistan’s importance in the cricket world as the team with the third-best Test record in history (behind only Australia and England), and as the producer of some of the game’s most enduring stars.

The great irony is that in fact much has been written on Pakistan cricket. The reason why it doesn’t make it to bookstores around the world has more to do with the self-serving priorities of international publishers and the relatively small niche audience (i.e., Pakistan cricket fans who like to read) to whom these books would appeal. This makes books on Pakistan cricket an unprofitable product that cannot survive the struggles of the global marketplace.

Yet, book publishing, although a commercial venture out of necessity, also has a high-minded obligation to advance and acknowledge what is worthy and relevant. It is Pakistan cricket’s good fortune that such publishers do exist, either in the form of esoteric enterprises or more often through facilitated self-publication. The drawback is that this substantial literature exists mostly in private collections and cannot be accessed by the casual fan. It takes personal contacts, word-of-mouth, intimacy with the culture of collecting, and sometimes a stroke of good luck at Sunday Bazar or on an internet auction website, to find something good. Still, for those with the right determination and motivation, it is there to be found.

In what surely counts as a heroic effort, the collective written works on Pakistan cricket have now been brought together in a single grand list, titled, Journey through the bibliography of Pakistan cricket (1947-2009) by K.H. Baloch, a well-known name among Pakistan cricket aficionados. It is a sizeable volume, running nearly 200 pages, and has been published in the UK by a company called Christopher Saunders, which specialises in cricket books and memorabilia. The interested enthusiast can purchase a copy from the publisher’s website for £30.

A medical doctor who qualified from Liaquat Medical College (Jamshoro) in 1963, Dr Khadim Hussain Baloch was a committed cricket devotee from boyhood days. Hailing from a family where cricket was revered and respected, he went on to attend St Patrick’s High School in Karachi, where his love for cricket took root. His first piece of cricket writing was during medical college days, when one of his articles appeared in a local Hyderabad publication called Indus Times.

Over the years, Dr Baloch has produced 10 cricket books, many with arcane details on Pakistan cricket and cricketers that cannot be found anywhere else. He has been a prolific contributor to iconic magazines like, The Cricketer Pakistan and Akhbar-e-Watan, which generations of Pakistan cricket fans have grown up with.

Reflecting on his output, Dr Baloch feels that the bibliography was his most technically demanding project. Indeed, the range of this work stretches from the pre-partition period to modern times, and it covers not just books but also periodicals, magazines, statistical manuals, souvenirs, annuals, and even many brochures and programmes. An especially noteworthy aspect is a section on published work on Pakistan cricket in Urdu.

Dr Baloch is the lead compiler of this work, but he has had able assistance from Mohammed Salim Parvez, David Wilkinson, and Mohammad Shoaib Ahmed. In a gesture that will resonate loudly with cricket fans throughout the country, the entire effort is dedicated to the late Gul Hameed Bhatti, the father of cricket statistics in Pakistan.

It is entirely fitting that a work of such scope and magnitude was undertaken by Dr Baloch. Along with the seasoned journalist Qamar Ahmed and the late commentator and scribe Omar Kureishi, he can rightfully be regarded as one of the doyens of cricket-writing in Pakistan. Insiders know that these three senior figures have never quite seen eye-to-eye, but after a lifetime of contributing quality literature for and on Pakistan cricket, they collectively cast a wise and grand shadow.

They have dedicated themselves to making Pakistan cricket look good, and in this they are an inspiration and a role model to us all.