A five-man army led by former India captain Kapil Dev has filed a public interest petition in the Delhi high court challenging the International Cricket Council's player terms for the World Cup.

According to the petition, though 80 per cent of the ICC's funds are generated from Indian sponsors, cricket's governing body is imposing rigid, unfair conditions on Indian players to participate in the tournament starting next month.

Former Board of Control for Cricket in India president N K P Salve, former Indian cricketer and selector Madan Lal, former international umpire Ram Babu Gupta, and former West Bengal chief minister Siddhartha Shankar Ray are the other four petitioners.

"Someone had to do it. We did it," Madan Lal, a prominent member of India's 1983 World Cup-winning squad, said.

Madan Lal told rediff.com that the players were right in protesting against the contracts, which he said were blatantly one-sided.

The group of five litigants is intriguing. Salve was president of the BCCI in 1983 when Ray and his wife requested him to arrange for two tickets, not complimentary passes, for the India-West Indies final at Lord's. But Salve's counterpart at the Test and County Cricket Board reportedly snubbed him and the furious BCCI boss swore to get even by seizing the organisation of the tournament from English hands.

Madan Lal said the current unity amongst the players was a very good sign. Since 1983, he said, he had not seen such a
closely knit team.

"Kapil and I have been thinking about it for a long time," he said. "Finally we decided that enough is enough and filed the petition. The World Cup is about to start. What is the point in pressurizing the players with unjust contracts?”

Seeking a direction to the central government not to allow any tax benefits to the sponsors, and another to the ICC to sort out the issue amicably, the petitioners said this was necessary for the betterment of the game.

A division bench of the court comprising acting Chief Justice Devinder Gupta and Justice B D Ahmed issued notices on the petition to the Centre, the ICC and its marketing arm, ICC Development International, the BCCI, the Reserve Bank of India and six sponsors.

Notice was issued to the RBI because the money is sent to the ICC through it.

Others named as respondents in the case are Pepsi, Hero Honda, LG Electronics, Nimbus Communications, TVS Motors, Coca-Cola, Sahara India Financial Corporation, and Samsung Electronics.

All the respondents have been asked to file their replies by Tuesday, January 21.

Madan Lal said the move was not backed by the BCCI, though all five petitioners have been closely associated with the board and have held important positions in it at one time or the other. Neither was the Indian team consulted before the petition was filed, he added.

Asked about the source of funds to fight the case, he only said: "We will let everybody know by Monday what we will do about the case."

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