The comment by the chairman of the selection committee says it all. "Unfortunately we do not have good spinners in the land of spinners," was Chandu Borde's helpless observation while answering reporters' queries after announcing the Indian team for the second Test against Australia.

And to think that this country had always been blessed in the matter of spin bowlers. In fact India have produced the most fascinating variety of bowlers who could play tricks with the ball and bemuse bewildered batsmen to their doom. Indeed, there was an embarrassment of riches for world class spin bowlers came not in ones and twos but in trios and quartets. In the fifties there was Vinoo Mankad, Ghulam Ahmed and Subash Gupte. In the early sixties, there was Salim Durrani, Chandu Borde and Bapu Nadkarni. And then of course for a decade and a half, Indian cricket basked in the glory of the spin quartet. The deeds of Bedi, Chandra, Prasanna and Venkat were not only hailed all over the cricketing world, they also helped transform the Indian team. From a second rate side, the Indians in the seventies were a team to be feared and respected. The quartet drove shivers down the spine of the best of batsmen in much the same manner that they feared facing up to the thunderbolts of Lillee and Thomson, Roberts and Holding.

Spin then has been our traditional strength and so strong has been this force that they have been able to cover up for obvious weaknesses in the pace department. The sight of a Chandra opening the attack or a Bedi coming on for the third over were signs of this. In the eighties, virtually one man, Kapil Dev, covered up for the lacuna in the spin area which followed the breaking up of the spin quartet. But spin was back where it belonged in the 90s thanks to Anil Kumble. Quickly becoming the kingpin of the attack, Kumble dwarfed his other contemporaries and even as there was talk of another spin trio and another golden era of spin in the offing, it was obvious by the end of the decade that he was a one man execution squad.

So much so that now with Kumble out of action for some months with an injured shoulder, the spin cupboard in the country is suddenly bare. Never before have the selectors been reduced to resorting to such desperate measures. They have tried all sorts of permutations and combinations, examined every spin bowler in the land worth having a close look, brought in new players, recalled old stars, given chances to leg spinners, off spinners, left arm spinners in an effort to find the winning combo. In the one off Test against Bangladesh they played Sunil Joshi and Murali Kartik. In the first Test against Zimbabwe, the same two bowlers were retained. In the second Test they went for Joshi and Sharandeep. Against Australia at Mumbai the combination was Rahul Sanghvi and Harbhajan. Now for the second Test they have recalled Venkatpathi Raju and brought in Sharandeep. In the meantime, they named seven spin bowlers - Balaji Rao, Sharandeep, Harbhajan, Sanghvi, Raju, Kartik and Joshi - in the 25 probables named for the camp before the series against Australia and then added Hirwani and Bahutule. The selectors have seen enough material even in the tour matches. They picked Sanghvi, Balaji Rao and Harbhajan Singh for India A and then saw Bahutule, Ramesh Powar and Nilesh Kulkarni in the match between Mumbai and the Australians. In the just concluded game at New Delhi, the spin bowlers were Sharandeep, Hirwani and Sridharan Sriram.

No one then can really blame the selectors for not throwing the net wide. But the sad fact is that the current spinners are just not in the class of their predecessors. As Borde himself noted during the camp "None of the spinners are giving air to the ball and are bowling very flat." And Venkat, who knows a thing or two about spin bowling also shook his head in dismay. "I am not happy with the way our spinners are bowling. They are not willing to maintain a rhythm and bowl each ball differently. Our spinners were unable to turn the ball as much as Sachin Tendulkar did at the nets," a telling comment from a man who calls a spade a spade.

Even opponents who have relished their duels with Indian spin bowlers are shaking their heads in disbelief at the present state of the art that has been paramount in Indian cricket. Former Australian captain Bill Lawry, who had fascinating duels with Prasanna, Bedi and Venkat during the 1969-70 series, hit the nail on the head. "The problem for India will be they won't bowl Australia out twice. Without Kumble they will struggle. They haven't got a Prasanna or a Bedi." And Ashley Mallett, who on the same tour picked up a point or two from the Indian bowlers, summed up the situation succinctly. "Where are the Indian spinners hiding? This Australian batting line-up will belt hell out of poor spin bowling, but they do struggle against top-flight stuff."

The plain fact however is that there are no spin bowlers in hiding. What you see is what you get and whether one likes to admit it or not, the dozen spinners called to the camp or seen in the Tests or the tour games is the best that we have. That is the whole sorry tale of Indian spin bowling, which of course also means that is the sad story of Indian cricket itself.

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