India on Red Alert After Kidnap Threat

Security has been stepped up around the Indian team after Sachin Tendulkar and Sourav Ganguly were identified by New Delhi police as potential kidnap targets of the terrorist group that has claimed responsibility for last week's attack on an American cultural centre in Calcutta.

The police investigation concluded that the group headed by Aftab Ansari, a Dubai-based terrorist, planned to seize Tendulkar for ransom and trade Ganguly for the release from an Indian jail of the terrorist Mohammad Amir Khan.

Police protection has been quietly strengthened at the homes of both players throughout the one-day series and the security measures at the grounds, a feature ever since England arrived for the Test series in mid-November, were again expected to be strict for today's fifth one-day international at the Kotla stadium in the capital.

The revelation of New Delhi police fears was contained in a brief report leaked to the Hindustan Times, and was written on the same day that the attack on the American Centre, in which four guards died, took place. Ansari jumped bail in New Delhi in 1998 as he awaited multiple charges of kidnapping and murder.

The England squad, after light nets in the morning, passed yesterday afternoon visiting the Taj Mahal, a rare tourist excursion in a condensed itinerary. Even that opportunity was by no means certain; the Indian government has considered camouflaging it to guard against attack from the air. Yesterday it was partly covered in scaffolding.

Craig White was among the party after arriving from England to quicken his rehabilitation from a cartilage operation. He sustained the injury during the final Test just as he was showing glimpses of his best bowling form.

His bowling had become so undermined by injury at the start of the Test series that he was 6mph slower than in Pakistan a year earlier, and England were forced to call up Andrew Flintoff as additional cover. By the final Test, that deficiency had fallen to 3mph.

Now White has to rehabilitate again. "I've had a rough year with injuries, but it should be easier this time," he said. His aim is to be fit in time for the opening practice match in New Zealand next Friday.

He made an unusual entrance at the Kotla stadium yesterday, wearing a blond wig bought in a Scarborough joke shop. The squad then lined up to meet him on the outfield as if he was a visiting dignitary.

Meanwhile, the former England batsman John Crawley has resigned from his contract with Lancashire after a request to be released was turned down last year.

India's request to alter the three-man panel that will investigate the contentious Test series in South Africa last November has been refused by the International Cricket Council.