'Thanks, but no thanks!'

Two months ago, the scheme was launched with much media hype. Two months later, it effectively ended when former India star Kapil Dev returned to the Board of Control for Cricket in India a cheque for Rs 30,000, paid as honorarium when he took up the post of Chief Director of the Pitch and Grounds Committee.

As envisaged, the committee under Kapil Dev was meant to overhaul the conditions of Indian pitches. As phase one of the project, the ten top cricket stadia in India had been identified and it was decided that under Kapil's supervision, the respective groundstaff would prepare pitches with pace and bounce and movement, more in keeping with the ones obtaining abroad.

"So far, the committee has not met even once, nothing is happening other than hype in the media," says Kapil, explaining why he has, by returning the cheque, washed his hands off the project.

"It is a non-starter," admits a BCCI official.

Effectively, the BCCI project, estimated to cost in excess of Rs 5 million over a period of three years, is now effectively shelved. The only gainer being the board, which for a while gained enormous mileage, hyping the move as part of several projects designed to improve the state of Indian cricket.

It was then BCCI secretary, and now ICC president, Jagmohan Dalmiya who at a board working committee two months ago that Kapil would head a committee comprising Kasturi Rangan (south), Dhiraj Parsana (west), Vinod Mathur (central), Arun Lal (east) and Daljit Singh (north).

Kapil at the time volunteered to work free of charge. The board for its part decided to pay him an honorarium of Rs 30,000 per month for three years, while each zonal director would get Rs 15,000 per month. It was also proposed to spend an estimated Rs 1.2 million in procuring the services of expert curators from New Zealand.

This last was subsequently done. A team of curators from New Zealand did visit India, doing the rounds of the stadia, analysing soil samples and coming up with some suggestions. Their visit culminated in a workshop for Indian curators at Calcutta.

And that was it.

Nothing further was done, and Kapil Dev decided he had had enough.

So he quit. End of story.

End, too, of yet another board "initiative" to improve Indian cricket.