Indian cricket has been unable to shake off the shackles of politics and petty rivalry for the ongoing test match against Bangladesh at Hyderabad, One of India's most promising players K Nair has been sidelined at the instance of Virat Kohli, the Indian team captain. He was included in the 15 players for the test by the selection committee but on the eve of the Test match was dropped from the playing eleven.
Nair in his last outing had hit 303 not out against England at the Chennai test match. This was the last match of the series and helped Indian host its highest total ever of 756.
His innings was instrumental in India winning the match by an innings. Nair became only the second player in Indian cricket history of 85 years to hit a triple century after Virendra Shewag.
Exclusion of Nair
The exclusion of Nair smacks of rivalry and politics and the Indian captain has done a grave injustice to Indian cricket by trying to finish the career of the young player. It must be noted that this is the only case in world cricket history of 140 years where a fit player is dropped after scoring a triple century.
This is a dubious world record. He was also dropped from the playing XI for the one day and t-20 team against England. Many cricketers had commented adversely on this and Harbhajan Singh the man with over 400 test wickets had tweeted "hello guys, where is Karun Nair??
Who just scored 300 runs against England. He isn't part of practice games against England forget ODI. Wah kamal hai."
Petty rivalry
Petty rivalry and jealousy have been the bane of Indian cricket. In 1951 the two doyens of Indian cricket Vijay Hazare and Vijay Merchant batted selfishly trying to match each other's score for over two days, and India lost a golden opportunity to win against England.
There was an intense rivalry between Kapil Dev and Gavaskar and at one time Gavaskar got Kapil Dev dropped from the test team in 1978. There are tens of such examples.
Long-term effect
In this case, the exclusion from the team against Bangladesh was at the insistence of Virat Kohli. One can smell a sense of jealousy at the performance of Nair, who may have eclipsed the captain.
This was not to Kohli's liking, and he has got the player axed. In the bargain, the career of a promising player is gravely damaged. Who will call a spade a spade? The damage by Kohli to Indian cricket is incalculable. No wonder India for last 70 years has not been able to win an away series in Australia and South Africa.
