Hi Prem,

I am an ardent cricket lover who still thinks that cricket is at it best when played on a small lush green field, in plain white clothes, with a red ball on a pitch that gives both bowlers and batsmen a chance to excel. I am also one who thought that Indian cricket was shot dead in Calcutta, when the crowd there interrupted the World Cup semifinal.

In Toronto on Sunday, I was in Grandstand 4, the one adjacent to where Inzamam and other Pakistan players executed a pre-meditated assault. I was in a perfect position to see exactly what transpired. The TV cameras were too late to react and, hence, could not show the complete reality. Here is what exactly happened, and I hope, as someone who passionately follows the game and calls a spade a spade, you will be able to judge for yourself whether you should call Inzamam a sufferer or a perpetrator of a crime.

The guy in Grandstand 3 with a megaphone was jeering the Pakistan team, which I totally accept is unwarranted. He can cheer his team, but to jeer the other team is base. Still, what he said is to the effect that Salim Malik is old and is hiding in the dressing room, and that Inzamam is too fat to field. No, he did not call Inzamam's family names. (Azhar, though, was pestered with references to Sangita by, you will be surprised to learn, Indian fans). This went on for about an hour.

At long leg, which is right before Grandstand 3 where this event happened, was this young Pakistan player, Hasan Raza I think his name is, who was fielding there for most of the Indian innings till the incident happened. The audience there was pretty sportive, they cheered him whenever he fielded well or threw well and he himself was quite happy with the crowd's response. He was smiling all along to the pats he was getting from the crowd there, and even to a few jokes for him from the megaphone-wielding guy.

And then suddenly, the Pakistan 12th man walks out with a bat, Rameez asks Inzamam to go to long leg and Inzamam comes innocuosly jogging there. To my amazement, he then jumps into the stand, grabs the bat and runs wild at the guy with the megaphone. If not for the spectators and security staff curbing him, he would have broken the head of that guy. The guy with the megaphone was no match for Inzamam, and got really mauled. Even when the Canadian police took Inzamam back onto the field, he was trying to get back into the stands.

The cops first took the megaphone guy out of the stands, then they realised that they would get sued if they arrested the guy who was himself mauled rather than the other way around, and brought him back - only, this time, into the stand where I was.

The crowd was horrified to see what happened. An international cricketer, who thinks he is above law, perpetrated a pre-mediatated assault, that too with a cricket bat, before the eyes of thousands of fans and the TV cameras. How come the bat came out of the Pakistan dressing room when India was batting? Why did the 12th man carry it out, knowing that there was no need for it when his side was fielding? How come the captain, who is supposed to cool tempers down, replaces the young fielder, who was a crowd favourite at the long leg fence, with Inzamam who had asked for a bat from the dressing room? If this is not pre-meditated assault, what is? Why shouldn't the Canadian police arrest Inzamam for this crime and impound his passport? After all, irrespective of the provocation, Inzamam cannot hand out street justice, that too in a foreign country.

The guy with the megaphone has freedom of speech. Of course, he abused it, and the right thing for Inzaman and Rameez to do would have been to request the removal of megaphones, or even that particular spectator, from the ground. Instead, they assumed they are above law and perpetrated a crime.

After the incident, Inzamam comes and fields in the slips. There he took a good catch to dismiss Saurav , and that is good, that is what he should be doing. I love cricket and respect talent. Inzamam's career shouldn't be affected by some stupid spectator, but he should be told that he is not above law. Not certainly in Canada. He should be arrested, and released on bail. The ICC should ask him to apologize, and so should Ramiz for his part in the incident. I will say that the 12th man didn't have a choice, as he was a junior player and he had to obey his captain's orders, though, legally he would be liable for bringing out the bat when he knew what it was for.

Your article said that the spectator with the megaphone was arrested. No, he was not - he was taken away, and brought back just minutes later, and he was free in Grandstand 4 throughout the rest of the match.

The crowd continued to cheer Pak when they fielded well. The young fielder at the long leg fence was still cheered. These are eye-witness accounts by a fan who believes that cricket is a gentleman's sport and the crowds are stupid and totally wrong when they become the event rather than the spectators thereof. So, kindly make sure that cricket fans at large and the readers of your passionately written columns in particular get to know what happened in fact, and not the smoke-screen put up by Wasim Akram, who knows next to nothing about this incident, as he was sitting in the TV commentators' box at long-off when the incident happened at long-leg.

Prasad Chodavarapu

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