Now, as then, those watching him will do so with a mixture of hope and anxiety. Then, the hope was based on what they had heard about the boy wonder from Bombay, and the anxiety was about his ability to withstand the fearsome opponents that awaited him across the border.
Now, the hope is that he can harness his fading skills one last time and leave on a high, the anxiety that it will all end in a whimper. After all, history is replete with instances of great careers ending in failure. Even the most famous Test average in cricket history, as every cricket follower knows, was the product of a last innings duck.
Sandwiched between the tentative debut at Karachi and the grand finale at the Wankhede is a career the likes of which we are unlikely to see again. The sheer statistics are staggering: the relentless accumulation of runs, against all kinds of opposition, on all kinds of wickets, in all manner of formats and conditions, over two and a half decades. But it is likely that Tendulkar will be remembered not so much for keeping cricket statisticians in business as for the enchantment that his mesmerising talent produced in those who watched him play. In his pomp, in the closing years of the last century, Tendulkar frequently attained cricketing perfection in his stroke play, making some of the world's greatest bowlers look pedestrian.
However, the most fascinating aspect of Tendulkar's career has been his willingness to embrace the methods of the journeyman when time began to test his abilities. That was the crucial difference between him and Brian Lara, the other batting giant of his generation. Lara could not settle for mere mortality after tasting the elixir of genius; for Tendulkar batting remained a vocation that was worth pursuing through all the vicissitudes of form and age. It was the desire and ability to change his approach and technique in the face of new challenges, as much as his innate talent, that made Tendulkar compulsively watchable as a batsman even when he was well past his prime.
But the emotions stirred by Tendulkar's imminent departure from the game are not simply about cricket; they also reflect the individual and collective meanings that have been invested in him by a billion Indians. Tendulkar has been, for this cricket-obsessed nation, a reassuring constant during the turbulent transformation that it has undergone in the past 25 years. It is worth recalling that when Tendulkar walked out to bat in a Test match for the first time, the licence permit raj in India was yet to be dismantled, the Babri Masjid yet to be demolished, and the telecommunications revolution yet to take off. Through all these changes and their fractious consequences, Tendulkar has stood forth as a symbol of national unity and pride, his popular appeal cutting across the boundaries of caste, class, region and religion.
Thus viewed, the "Age of Tendulkar" can be set alongside the "Age of Grace" and the "Age of Bradman": epochs in which an extraordinary sporting hero became the focal point of the aspirations and anxieties of an entire society. It is the parallels with Bradman that are most frequently drawn in the case of Tendulkar, not least because the Don himself famously perceived the similarities in their styles. But it is the similarities between Grace and Tendulkar that are more compelling. They were both from professional middle-class backgrounds; W G's father was a doctor, Tendulkar's a college professor. Both grew up in milieus saturated with cricket - the "Doctor" on the outskirts of Bristol and the Little Master in Bandra - and both were able to rely on the support of their families as they set about carving out a career in cricket. Both attained cricketing fame as teenagers, with a series of astonishing feats in first-class cricket that made them an instant box-office draw. In both instances, again, the precocity of youth gave way to a canny adaptation to changing circumstances that enabled the two men to outlast their peers. And, by way of clinching evidence, consider this: both communicated on the field in a distinctive, high-pitched squeak, a charming incongruity that was not easily reconciled with their robust genius.
As India prepares to bid farewell to its greatest cricketer, perhaps we can leave the last word to C L R James: "He has enriched the depleted lives of two generations and millions yet to be born. He has extended our conception of human capacity and in doing all this he has done no harm to anyone." That heartfelt tribute to W G Grace could serve equally well for Sachin Tendulkar.
The author is a senior lecturer at the University of Leicester
(Note: Barun Roy's column Asia File will appear on Friday)