MUMBAI, 1 February 2008 — For the first time in its haughty existence did the International Cricket Council have to eat a humble pie. It just could not stand up to a righteous pressure being exerted on it by the most powerful cricket board in the world, which was backed to the hilt by its entire populace in its fight for justice.
At stake for India was not just the hasty and unjust punishment meted out on a racist charge to one of its cricketers, Harbhajan Singh, but also the very honor of a nation which had itself been at the vanguard of the fight against racism.
The Board of Control for Cricket in India had made it clear that if the three-Test ban imposed on Singh after the Sydney Test fiasco, was not overturned, Team India would forgo the rest of the tour of Australia and return home. The message was loud and clear, as the very judgment of ICC match referee Mike Procter was not based on the most basic of principles of natural justice.
By his own admission, Procter had maintained that there was no evidence whatsoever that Harbhajan had uttered racist abuse and that he had relied merely on the word of two Australian players, even as he ignored the deposition of the Indian players, including Sachin Tendulkar, who was with Harbhajan at the batting creaser when the incident, involving Andrew Symonds, occurred.
Harbhajan went in for an appeal which the ICC had perforce to admit. An independent judge, John Hansen from New Zealand, held the appeal hearing on Tuesday. Bemoaning the lack of it earlier, Cricket Australia and TV rights owner Channel Nine purportedly produced new evidence — an audio-recording from the stump-microphone — at the appeal proceedings.
In this recording, the voices of Symonds and skipper Ponting were heard, but what Harbhajan had uttered was hardly audible. Cricket Australia had perhaps anticipated that the new evidence, which they even released to the media in advance, may not hold much water and, as such, had decided to keep a letter handy which in so many words suggested the withdrawing the racist charge against Harbhajan.
The letter was submitted just before the hearing began. Justice Hansen, however, went over the new evidence and concluded that there was no admissible evidence to suggest that Harbhajan had hurled any racist remark.
He overturned the earlier sentence of the match-referee and just fined the Indian off-spinner fifty per cent of his match fees, which in itself was a face-saving piece of judgment for the sake of the Australian players and match referee Mike Procter.
