Recently, many imminent journalists and some news websites have accused Indian cricket of being unfair to the SC/ST and Dalit cricketers. Though selection in the Indian team and even in the state team is based on merit and talent; some media houses are calling for reservations in cricket teams as well.

Journalists have called cricket an upper caste Brahman dominated sport until the advent of Kapil Dev, who came from the fields of Haryana.

Now, a news website known as thewire.in has published a piece on their website with the headline “Does India need A Caste-Based Quota in Cricket?” and they shared the site on their Twitter handle with a stat that “In the 86 years since India attained Test status, only 4 out of 290 players belong to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes.”

This attempt to introduce the vices of caste politics in a talent-based sport like cricket didn’t go too well down with former India cricketer Mohammad Kaif. Kaif represented India in the 2000s with much success and only recently announced his retirement.

Kaif responded to the tweet with a message of his own, saying, “How many prime time journalists are SC or ST or for that matter how many senior editors in your organisation are SC or ST. Sports is perhaps one field which has successfully broken barriers of caste,players play with inclusiveness but then we have such journalism to spread hatred”