Delhi: There is no comparison to the amount of buzz that a cricketer from Bihar named Vaibhav Suryavanshi (born 27 March 2011) has been garnering during and after the IPL mega tournament. The biggest thing behind this is that this cricketer, who was only 13 years old, was bought by Rajasthan Royals (RR) for Rs 1.10 crore. He is not only the cricketer with the record of youngest age to be included and sold in this IPL auction, he is also set to make the record of being the youngest to play in IPL.

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Now more than her talent, her age is in the news and allegations of misrepresenting her age are being raised in the media. One of his interviews from last year is going viral on social media, according to which he was 14 years old only last year, so how has his age reduced by one year now? If BCCI is to be believed, they say that according to the documents given by Vaibhav, his age is not yet 14 years and that is why Vaibhav was not allowed to play in the Under-16 Vijay Merchant Trophy. On the other hand, a new issue is whether such a small player should be allowed to play white ball cricket?

Note on Vaibhav's age:

• The franchise he plays for has not seen him win a trophy in 2008 because he was not even born then.
• Rajasthan Royals have on average picked a younger team than all the others. Not a single player in the team is above 32 years of age (oldest: Sandeep Sharma 31 years).
• Special records made within 3 days:
  On 23 November 2024, Vaibhav played official T20 cricket at the youngest age.
  On 25 November 2024, Vaibhav became the youngest player to be sold in the IPL auction. The age that day was 13 years and 243 days.
• When India won the 2011 ODI World Cup, Vaibhav was not even a month old. Born 3 years after the inauguration of IPL.
• 4 players who can participate in IPL 2025 at the age of 18 years and below: C Andre Siddharth, Allah Ghazanfar, Vaibhav Suryavanshi and Kwena Mafaka.
• The Royals also selected South Africa's 18-year-old Kwena Mafaka. He has played 3 T20 Internationals.
• Vaibhav's record: 5 first class matches for Bihar (100 runs in 10 innings) and one T20 match (13 runs in just 6 balls in Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy).
• 3 youngest players of IPL: Vaibhav Suryavanshi can make the record and after him: Allah Ghazanfar (15 years 161 days) and Prayas Ray Barman (16 years).

Now something about Vaibhav Suryavanshi. Resident of Samastipur. In the 2023–24 Ranji Trophy season, he made his debut against Mumbai at the age of just 12 years and 284 days, becoming the youngest player in the tournament. In this case, the records of legends like Yuvraj Singh (15 years 57 days) and Sachin Tendulkar (15 years 230 days) were broken.

Vaibhav's name also shone outside India when he scored 104 runs on 62 balls in the Youth Test series against Australia in Chennai. That is why Australian media wrote a lot in the news after the mega auction that a 13 year old boy was sold and many of our good players were left empty handed. At the age of 13 years and 188 days, he became the youngest to score 100 in professional cricket (previous record: Nazmul Hossain Shanto of Bangladesh) and also the fastest 100 by any Indian in youth cricket. This 100 was made in just 58 balls (better than this only: England's Moeen Ali in 56 balls).

Khabbu, a top order batsman, was eyed by many IPL teams and hence a mini 'bid war' was also seen. Both Delhi Capitals and Royals kept increasing the bids. However, the Royals have faith in his talent and the team even invited Vaibhav to their High Performance Center in Nagpur where Vaibhav greatly influenced their coaching set-up. Now he will practice with players like Joffra Archer, Wanindu Hasaranga and Mahesh Diksha.

Now the question of his age is in discussion. His father, Sanjeev Suryavanshi, says that when he was eight and a half years old, BCCI had conducted a bone test to check his age and the age given was correct. They are ready to test Vaibhav's age again. Vaibhav, who is studying in 8th class in Samastipur, is currently in discussion in the entire cricket world.

There is no doubt that there are many incidents of age falsification in Indian cricket, hence BCCI should take initiative in this matter and clarify the situation so that the discussion is about his talent and not on the allegation of 'fraud' of wrong age.