CRICKET FEUD: Is it Australia vs India Feud OR Australia vs Brahmin, Sikh, Muslim Feud ?

The other day I attended a Freelancers Workshop hosted in Bombay. There were people from different backgrounds, let it be caste or religion. In the course of the meeting we had conversations ranging from the inception of Cricket in India to the latest feud that ocurred between Australia and India. One of these was a question that has opened the eyes, raised the brows and clean bowled all of us. It is the question of Caste and Religion based politics in the Indian Cricket. The facts are as below:

Brahmins constitute 3% of the Indian Population, but 70% of the Indian Cricket Team are Brahmins. Why does rest of India bother so much about a match of Any Country vs Brahmins ? BITE to think about twice.

Latest Indian Cricket Squad, Test Match Series: Australia v India Dec-2007 and Jan-2008 in Australia
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Jaffer -- Muslim
Dravid -- Brahmin
Laxman -- Brahmin
Tendulkar -- Brahmin
Ganguly -- Brahmin
Yuvraj -- Singh
Dhoni -- Singh
Kumble -- Brahmin
Harbhajan -- Singh, Sikh
RP Singh -- Singh
Sharma -- Brahmin
Zaheer -- Muslim

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List of Brahmin Indian Cricketers (Both Current and Former):
This list is not exhaustive (-:

Ajit Agarkar
Ajit Wadekar
Anil Kumble
Ashok Mankad
B.S. Chandrasekhar
Chandrakant Pandit
Chetan Sharma
CR Rangachari
Debashis Mohanty
Dileep Sardesai
Dilip Vengsarkar
G.R. Vishwanath
Hrishikesh Kanitkar
Javagal Srinath
Kirti Azad
Krishnamachari Srikanth
Krishnan Sasikiran
M J Gopalan
M.R. Srinivas Prasad
Madan Lal
Rahul Dravid
Ravi Shastri
Rohan Gavaskar
S. Venkataraghavan
Sachin Tendulkar
Sadagopan Ramesh
Salil Ankola
Saurav Ganguly
Shubhangi Kulkarni
Sudararajan Kidambi
Sunil Gavaskar
Sunil Joshi
TE Srinivasan
V.V.S. Laxman
Venkatesh Prasad
W V Raman
Yashpal Sharma

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BITE

http://churumuri.wordpress.com/2008/01/05/just-4-of-population-but-7-brahmins-in-indian-xi/
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BITE

Source: http://www.echarcha.com/forum/showthread.php?t=12257

Magazine | February 1, 2003

The High Priests of Indian Cricket

Test team vs England;
1st Test at Lord’s, 1971
(Match drawn)
Brahmins: 7

Ashok Mankad
Sunil Gavaskar
Ajit Wadekar
Dileep Sardesai
G.R. Vishwanath
S. Venkataraghavan
B.S. Chandrasekhar

Non Brahmins
Farokh Engineer
Eknath Solkar
Abid Ali
Bishen Singh Bedi
1983 World Cup winning team

Brahmins 5

Sunil Gavaskar
Kris Srikkanth
Yashpal Sharma
Kirti Azad
Madan Lal

Non Brahmins

Mohinder Amarnath
Sandeep Patil
Kapil Dev
Roger Binny
Syed Kirmani
Balwinder S. Sandhu
1986 team. England Vs India ,
Kensington Oval, London,
May 24 1986

Brahmins: 6

Kris Srikkanth
Sunil Gavaskar
Dilip Vengsarkar
Ravi Shastri
Chetan Sharma
Chandrakant Pandit

Non Brahmins

Mohd Azharuddin
Sandeep Patil
Kapil Dev
Roger Binny
Maninder Singh
Test team; Vs S Africa,
2nd Test at Cape Town,
1997 (S. Africa won)

Brahmins 8

W.V. Raman
Rahul Dravid
Saurav Ganguly
Venkatesh Prasad
Sachin Tendulkar
V.V.S. Laxman
Anil Kumble
Javagal Srinath

Non Brahimin

Mohd Azharuddin
Nayan Mongia
Dodda Ganesh
One-Day series Final,
S. Africa vs India;
Durban. Feb 13, 1997

Brahmins 7

Sachin Tendulkar
Saurav Ganguly
Rahul Dravid
Salil Ankola
Anil Kumble
Javagal Srinath
Venkatesh Prasad

Non Brahmin

Mohd Azharuddin
Ajay Jadeja
Robin Singh
Saba Karim
Carlton & United Series, Australia,
Final against Australia,
Adelaide, Jan 26, 2000

Brahmins 8

Sachin Tendulkar
Saurav Ganguly
Rahul Dravid
Hrishikesh Kanitkar
Anil Kumble
Javagal Srinath
Venkatesh Prasad
Debashis Mohanty

Non Brahmins

Jacob Martin
Robin Singh
Sameer Dighe
India Vs New Zealand,
2nd Test at Hamilton,
Dec 2002 (Ind lost)

Brahmins 4

Rahul Dravid
Sachin Tendulkar
Saurav Ganguly
V.V.S. Laxman

Non Brahmins

Sanjay Bangar
Virender Sehwag
Parthiv Patel
Harbhajan Singh
Zaheer Khan
Ashish Nehra
Tinu Yohannan
Current one-day World Cup team 2003

Brahmins 6 in 15

Saurav Ganguly
Rahul Dravid
Sachin Tendulkar
Anil Kumble
Javagal Srinath
Ajit Agarkar

Non Brahmins

V. Sehwag,
Harbhajan Singh,
Zaheer Khan,
Ashish Nehra,
D. Mongia,
Parthiv Patel,
Sanjay Bangar,
Yuvraj Singh,
Mohd Kaif
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So the Big Question is ?

IS IT AUSTRALIA VS INDIA ? -- ANY OTHER COUNTRY VS INDIA ?

OR

IS IT AUSTRALIA VS BRAHMINS, MUSLIMS, SINGHS ? -- ANY OTHER COUNTRY VS BRAHMINS, MUSLIMS, SINGHS ?

ONCE AGAIN, KUDOS TO ME FOR BRINGING OUT THE FACTS FROM YESTERDAY'S WORKSHOP.