NEW DELHI (Reuters)
Former India cricket players have joined a chorus of calls for India to think about pulling out of their Test series against South Africa in protest over the handling of the Sachin Tendulkar ball-tampering controversy.

"It's a stand-off and we should not relent," former Test medium-pacer Atul Wassan told Reuters.

Jagmohan Dalmiya, president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), said he would comment on the controversy at a news conference due in the eastern city of Calcutta at around 1600 (1030 GMT).

Match referee and former England captain Mike Denness gave star batsman Sachin Tendulkar a suspended one-match ban for ball-tampering during the drawn second Test against South Africa in Port Elizabeth on Tuesday.

Five other Indian players, including captain Sourav Ganguly, were either banned or given suspended bans for dissent and for bringing the game into disrepute by appealing excessively.

Dalmiya had asked the International Cricket Council (ICC) to replace Denness as referee for the third and final Test, or have his decisions suspended until they were examined by the ICC, but the sport's governing body turned down the request on Wednesday.

The United Cricket Board of South Africa (UCBSA) has come out in support of the Indian board.

UCBSA chief executive Gerald Majola said: "The UCBSA is extremely sympathetic to the position of the Indian board and their team on the harshness of the match referee's decisions."

Indian newspapers and some members of parliament have said India should consider pulling out of the South Africa series in protest at the referee's decision.

"By rejecting the BCCI's demands, the ICC has made this a staring match," said Wassan. "You have to meet somewhere in the middle. If they had said 'we won't remove Denness but keep the bans in abeyance and look into them later', it may have been acceptable. But this outright rejection should not be tolerated," he added.

Former India captain and coach Ajit Wadekar said the players must have a right of appeal against a referee.

"Even murderers have a right of appeal. If the ICC does not do anything, the Indian board must take legal action," he said. "I don't see any harm in the team pulling out from the series as well, because it seems the ICC has dismissed our request outright."

But former India skipper Bishan Singh Bedi, while condemning Denness's decision, said pulling out would be an overreaction.

"We should just play on," he said. "Just because Denness has made a bad decision on an off day, doesn't mean we make a bad decision also. Two wrongs don't make a right."

Demonstrations continued in India for the second day as a few hundred protestors burnt effigies of Denness in New Delhi.

Carrying banners saying "Sachin, Sourav - the country is with you" and "Why such injustice against India?", they marched towards the Indian parliament shouting slogans.

Similar demonstrations were held on Wednesday in Ganguly's home town Calcutta, a city known for its passion for cricket.

A spokesman for the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party said on Wednesday that the Indian team should pull out of the South African series if it were proved that the penalties imposed on the Indian players stemmed from racial discrimination.

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