Harbhajan Singh, a former India off-spinner, recounted an emotional interaction with the daughter of his former teammate S. Sreesanth.

Harbhajan talked about how he was devastated when she informed him she didn't want to talk to him since he had hit her father during the 2008 IPL. Harbhajan, who played for the Mumbai Indians, slapped Kings XI Punjab's (now Punjab Kings) Sreesanth at the end of a match.

“One thing I’d want to change in my life is that incident with Sreesanth. I want to remove that incident from my career. That is the incident I would change from my list. What transpired was wrong, and I shouldn’t have done what I did. I apologized 200 times.

What I felt so bad about was that even years after that incident, I have been apologizing every opportunity or stage I get. It was a mistake. We all make mistakes, and we hope and try never to repeat such mistakes. He was my teammate, and we were playing together. Yes, in that game we were opponents. But it shouldn’t have gone to the level where we behaved in such a manner. So yeah, that was my fault, and the only fault of his was that he provoked me—but that’s okay, actually. However, what I did was not okay. I said, ‘Sorry,' Harbhajan said on R Ashwin’s YouTube show Kutti Stories.

Then Harbhajan Singh recalled the most heartbreaking interaction he had with Sreesanth’s daughter. He revealed that the Kerala star’s daughter refused to talk to him, saying that he had hit her father.

“What hurt me even more, years later, was when I met his daughter. I was talking to her with a lot of love, and she said, ‘I don’t want to talk to you. You hit my father.’ My heart was shattered, and I was on the verge of tears. I kept asking myself, what kind of impression have I left on her? She must be thinking of me in a poor light, right? She sees me as the guy who hit her father.

I felt so bad. I still apologize to his daughter, knowing I can’t undo what happened. I keep telling her, ‘If there’s anything I can do to make you feel better or make you think I’m not that kind of person, please tell me. I just hope that when she grows up, she doesn’t see me in the same light. I hope she sees that her uncle is someone who will always be there for her and support her in any way he can. That’s why I want to remove that chapter,” Harbhajan said.

Harbhajan Singh and Sreesanth later made up and were even part of India’s 2011 World Cup-winning team.