Protesting attacks,Sena bans Aussie cricketers

While calling on other states to do the same,he reiterated the Sena ban on Pakistani players. In 1991,Senas Shishir Shinde now an MNS MLA and other party activists had dug up the Wankhede Stadium pitch to protest a scheduled India-Pakistan match.

Nowadays,self-respect and patriotism are seen nowhere. A question always crops up whether Indian cricket players have any patriotism or not, Thackeray said. It was shameful that our players were playing matches with Australia at a time when Indians were attacked there,he added.

Thackeray said Bachchan had shown fiery nationalism and self-esteem for refusing an Australian university award last year.

Meanwhile,a delegation of the Shiv Senas Sthaniya Lokadhikar Hakka Samiti Mahasangh met officials of the State Bank of India here and demanded that candidates from Maharashtra be recruited at different posts in the bank. They demanded that the candidates knowledge of Marathi be examined in the written test and the applications of only those candidates who had passed Class X and XII exams with Marathi as a subject be approved.