Sachin Tendulkar is already a 'Bharat Ratna' for Indian people because of his phenomenal success and the manner in which he has served Indian cricket for years.

Reading allows me to recharge my batteries.

I was given a talent to play cricket. I don't know why I was given it. But I was. I owe it to all those who wish it had been them to give of my best, every day.

Sometimes fitness is a good thing to have, but you have to recognise that fitness takes you only so far, and skills are the most important thing. Fitness just helps you execute those cricketing skills for longer and more consistently, maybe.

You get an image in the first couple of years of your career, and then whether you like it or not, you are stuck with it for the rest of your life.

I am not the only intense or intellectual cricketer. I played with other cricketers who could be pretty intense and intellectual.

The bowlers I respected or feared or rated were not the ones who gave me lip or stared at me or abused me. More the ones who, at any stage of the game, when had they had the ball in hand, they were going to be at me, and they were going to have the skill and the fitness and the ability to be aggressive.