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Ban Gautam Gambhir had hardly ended his celebrations of double ton in the third test between India and Australia when he was handed a one-match ban for a level 2 offense as per the International Cricket Council Code of Conduct on Friday morning. According to the rules he can appeal against the decision within 24 hours of the notification of the decision. The ban has been imposed on Gambhir for deliberately elbowing Australian all-rounder Shane Watson one the first day of the third test being played in the Firoze Shah Kotla ground in New Delhi. During the hearing, match referee Chris Broad had found both Gambhir and Watson guilty of conduct contrary to the spirit of the game. Watson too, was fined 10 percent of his match fee. Because of ban Gambhir can not play in the fourth and the final test match of the series that will be played in Nagpur. Meanwhile, Gambhir have decided to appeal against the one-test ban decision.

Sydney Test Though, it is not an abnormal incident as for as the test cricket is concerned, because such kind of incidents happen almost in every test, sometimes they get ignored and sometimes can result in some minor punishments. In the second test Zaheer Khan was also fined 50 percent of his match fee. But this incident has a special significance if we recall the incidents of Sydney test that was played between both the teams and resulted in one of the biggest international cricket controversy. After that test Australian players had made allegations of racism against their counterparts. After it Indian team had decided to quit the tour which had forced the Australians to backtrack.

Aggressiveness As the series is progressing rivalry between both the teams is also rising to the new heights. Though both the teams say that ‘what ever happens in the playground, is left in the playground’ but former Australian cricketer Adam Gilchrist’s comments are totally different to their claims. Earlier he had targeted Sachin Tendulkar and now it is the turn of Ganguly and Bhaji. All these incidents, collectively, indicate that both the teams have not forgotten the bad memories of the Sydney test. Some younger players of both of the teams are following the same path of the their seniors. Though aggressiveness is the part of the game but some times they cross the limits and it results in such incidents.

Blasts Serial blasts in various Indian cities have put the centre government under tremendous pressure. First it was Jaipur which was followed by Bangalore, Ahmadabad, Surat, the national capital Delhi and now Assam. All these cities were targeted by the terrorists in a well-planned method. Though after the Jamia Nagar encounter various security agencies were claiming that they have failed terrorists’ planning of conducting similar kind of destructive activities but Assam blasts have once again exposed that how old, wrong and misguiding our secret services are. On the other hand centre as well as state governments, too, are busy with their own political interests instead of fighting the threat with a firm will.

Security Agencies After blasts and Jamia Nagar encounter, leaders of various national and regional parties were busy to pacify a particular community. They were doing this with an eye on the forthcoming Lok Sabha and assembly elections in various states. In this way, instead of favoring that particular community they were, indirectly linking it with the terrorists. We can not deny that police, secret agencies and the centre government have completely failed to prevent the disaster in its earlier stages. If security agencies had some information about the serial blasts, they did nothing to prevent the incidents from happening. In the second stage various state police departments tried to take the ‘credit’ by bursting the ‘terrorist cells’ but their eyes opened only after it when city after city became target of the serial blasts. Indirectly the various state police departments, too, helped the terrorists by not sharing the information with their counterparts.

Government The first two failures can be removed by increasing cooperation between various secret and police departments but what can be done with the centre government that has only ‘one eye’. When more than thirty lakh people were rendered homeless and begging for food and shelter because of Kosi floods it had been ‘blinded’ by the n-deal. It also failed to take appropriate action at the right time when communal riots had broken up in Orissa and Assam. It is true that India faced may problems in a very short span of time but it is also true that centre government stepped in only after PM Manmohan Singh took initiative. Now the question lies what the other ‘ministers’ were doing. Home minister Shivraj Patil was busy handling ‘home’ instead of nation. Same was with other ministers too. Now elections are nearing and all the political parties have started to use these incidents as issues in the elections. Instead of removing the shortcomings all the ‘responsible forces’ are blaming each other for the failures.

Shooting Kashmiri fruit traders stopped the shooting of a Hindi movie on Thursday and also forced the producer to delete all those scenes that were objectionable to the local people and portrayed them in bad lights. Director Rahul Dholakia was shooting some for his movie ‘Lamha’ in the Parimpora Fruit Mandi in the summer capital of the state, Srinagar. The local people objected to a seen that was being shot in the market. In the shot a person, clad in Kashmiri clothes was showed holding a gun while the others were loading fruits in a truck. In the scene fruit traders were presented as involved in the arms trade. Interestingly, the film unit was shooting without prior permission from the concerned authorities.

Objections The local people and the fruit traders had objected to the scene as it could be disastrous to the new opened trade links between the divided parts of the state. It must be learnt that India and Pakistan have resumed trade between both the divided parts of the state after the period of more than six decades. Thousands of people have died because of militancy in the state. Such scene in the film could have sent wrong messages about the Kashmiri people to the world community. So the Fruit traders objected to the shooting of the scene and also forced the film director to show the other reels also, later on all the objectionable reels were destroyed. The film crew also vowed not to show anything objectionable in the film.

Director On the other hand Dholakia claimed that he had sought permission from some shopkeepers of the fruit market for the shoot but they had not informed the fruit traders association. He said that film is based on a love story and presents Kashmir in a positive way. He said that ‘Lamha’ is only a commercial movies and has nothing to do with the political situation in the state. When asked about the gun wielding person being part of the shoot at the local fruit market, the director said, “ He was a bodyguard and not part of the actors in the film”. But on the other hand local traders said that fruit cartons loaded with artificial guns and ammunition were being shot in the particular scene when they forced the film unit to stop the shooting.