SC dismisses PIL on Sourav's exclusion

SC dismissed the petition questioning Ganguly's exclusion from Ahemdabad Test, saying cricket might be a popular game but it would not go into the issue of selection.

The Supreme Court on Friday refused to entertain a PIL questioning dropping of former skipper Sourav Ganguly for the third cricket Test in the recent series against Sri Lanka and a direction for the BCCI to formulate a guidelines for constituting a committee of national selectors.

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A bench headed by Justice Ruma Pal dismissed the petition saying cricket might be a popular game in the country but he would not go into the issue of selection of players.

Seeking scrapping of the existing selection committee headed by former wicket keeper Kiran More, the PIL filed by a TV journalist Kishore Kumar Malviya had sought a direction for the BCCI to place on record the minutes of the December 14 meeting of the committee which decided to drop Ganguly from the squad for the Ahmedabad Test.

The PIL said that apart from More, who is the Chairman of the Selection Committee, and B S Chandrashekhar, the other three members - Bhupinder Singh Singh (Sr), Sanjay Jagdale and Ranjib Biswal - had no experience of playing at international level.

Maintaining that the selection of the team would become transparent if BCCI formulated guidelines and criteria for the constitution of the Committee of national selectors, the PIL had sought a direction for the Board that members of the committee should have minimum of 10 to 15 years' experience of international cricket.

The petitioner had also sought framing of rules and regulations to override the decision of the selection committee in case it suffers from arbitrary and whimsical exercise of powers.