In recent years, he had undergone a few surgeries due to age-related illnesses.

In 22 of his 67 Test matches, Bedi captained India and took 266 wickets.

In 1966, he made his Test debut against West Indies. In 1979, he played his last Test against England at The Oval.

Bedi also played English county cricket for Northamptonshire and finished his career with 1,560 first-class wickets, the highest by any Indian bowler.

Bedi was a member of India’s world-beating spin bowling quartet in the 1960s and 1970s, which also included Erapalli Prasanna, Bhagwat Chandrasekhar and Srinivas Venkataraghavan. Readers chose Bedi for a place in 2021

In his school days, Bedi played cricket in Amritsar, a city in Punjab state in India. Upon turning 20, he became the 113th cricketer to represent India in Test matches.

His best bowling performance came in 1969 against Australia in Kolkata (then known as Calcutta), a Test match that India lost.

A spin bowling purist’s dream, Bedi wore a bright pink or blue turban. He bowled with a fluid action and a languid run-up. He describes the left arm spinner as “stealthy, silent and deadly, a master of deception who conjured variations in flight, loop, spin and pace without any perceptible change in action”.