Under the leadership of Shri N Kanniah, Southern Railway Institute, Perambur got promoted to First Division

Southern Railway Institute / Perambur(SRI/PER) is promoted to First Division yet again.  The success story is all too familiar and the secret mantra of success is not such a closed secret but an open secret. The secret is none other than Shri N Kanniah, Hony. Secretary and Captain of SRI/PER. Under Shri N Kanniah leadership, the team has been getting promoted to first division almost at will.

Apart from leading the side for the last 22 years Shri N Kanniah, being an avid fan and a follower of Cricket has placed the game on par, if not above, many of his compelling priorities including leading the trade union movement of the Organisation which is the largest employer of the country.  Cricketers have always found favours and the luxury of his time easy to come just because of his association and love for the game.

So many cricketeers who have donned whites for SRI/PER have gone on to become great cricketers with lot of accomplishment to name a few are Thalaivan Sargunam, Dushyant, Ananth Subramaniam, Prabhu, Ganapathy and many others.

So many Cricketeers who have played First Class Cricket have also been associated with and played for SRI/PER. To name a few Shri K Bharathan, Riaz, Feroz Rasheed, Suresh Kumar, Rejith Kumar, Sudhakar, Rohan Prem, Prasanth and many others.  Such is the confidence and comfort level Shri N Kanniah provides to the top level Cricketeers and they also reciprocate with lot of respect and admiration.

This year out and out it was a team performance under able leadership, bringing the best out of almost all the players. Experienced player Khader basha averaging 74.33 for the season and sterling all round performance by Raghu with batting average of 41.25 and 16 wickets leading the chart. Mitchell being the highest run getter for the season with 305 runs, Veerababu leading wicket taker with 26 wickets followed by allround support by Baskar with 22wickets with 217 runs. Veteran Cricketer Umapathy ably supporting with his explosive batting performance and Kamalnathan with his quick bowling abilities contributed to the promotion. Shri N Kanniah was ably supported and assisted by Shri R Ravishankar coach and mentor of SRI/PER.

Shri N Kanniah has identified many young cricketers to play for Railways and also at National level.  The talent scouting and the service he has done to Cricket is voluminous and the way he promotes youngsters should be a role model to be followed by cricket lovers.

Shri N Kanniah, a great cricketing enthusiast took over the SRI/PER at 5th Division level of Tamilnadu Cricket Association League (TNCA) and with his vision and innovative leadership brought SRI/PER from 5th Division to 1st Division during early 1990s. SRI/PER got promoted every year under his leadership during that time.

This time, after nearly a gap of 4 years SRI/PER once again under the dynamic leadership of Shri N Kanniah has been promoted to 1st division of the TNCA league. Promotion to first division this year, is very unique as SRI/PER did not lose a single match in second division throughout the year which is a very rare happening. Not many teams could achieve this during their promotion to first division in earlier years.

Shri N.Kanniah, Hony. Secretary and captain of the Southern Railway Institute cricket team received the C.P. Johnstone Shield TNCA 2^nd Division League Championship Shield from Shri R.Thyagarajan, Chairman and founder of Shriram Group, after leading the team to second division championship of TNCA recently.