The reasons for Dravid’s omission are not too clear. Although Vengsarkar says it is a break, ironically Dravid has been selected for the Karnataka Ranji squad!

People were speculating that the days of the big three - Sachin Tendulkar, Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly - in the Indian team were coming to an end. However they never expected that a senior sportsman like Dravid would be treated so shabbily.

Navjot Sidhu, who is on the expert panel of NDTV, found Dravid's omission hard to digest. "It is a disgrace to the selection process and the BCCI. We do not know how to respect our heroes. We do not know how to preserve our heritage," the Sardar told the channel.

Sidhu should know what he is talking about as he himself has been a victim to the varying whims of the selectors. Meanwhile Indian manager Lalchand Rajput also expressed surprise at Dravid’s exclusion. In a pressure series with Pakistan cool heads are a must and Dravid is the coolest head around.

Agreed his average in the last 10 games is nothing much to write home about, but Dravid is not the one to suffer lean trots for many games. It appears that India's Twenty20 success has triggered this thinking in the selection panel that the seniors must be phased out.

This line of thinking is admirable, but where are the replacements? the man who replaced Dravid in the line-up, Virrender Sehwag, has been a shadow of his self in the last couple of years. Those waiting in the wings include the likes of Suresh Raina, Badrinath and Dinesh Kartick. But do they have what it takes to match "The Wall"?

Ravi Shashtri supported the decision to omit Dravid saying seniors must be rested. Does this mean Tendulkar will be rested in the coming games even if he scored a couple of centuries early on? That scenario does not hold water.

The selectors will do the whole nation a favor by being transparent. Instead of dodging these questions with standard replies, their decision would have been better accepted if they had come out clearly saying Dravid was out of form. Hurtful perhaps, but it would at least have been the truth. What say Mr Vengsarkar?

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