In his notes which launch the 1999 edition of Wisden, editor Matthew Engel describes the scandal as the worst crisis since Bodyline, the short-pitched bowling controversy on England's Ashes tour of 1932-33.

``It is eating away at cricket's most vital asset -- its reputation for fair play,'' claimed Engel.

``Bodyline was easily solved by amending the laws. This one is far harder to control. Cricket's response so far has been pathetic, almost frivolous.''``Dalmiya almost split world cricket trying to take charge of ICC. Having succeeded, he has given the game no leadership whatever. He should resign and be replaced by someone capable of providing that leadership.''

``The Australian Cricket Board was finally forced to admit something it had known, and covered up, since February1995.''

Australians Mark Waugh and Shane Warne, who had made the original allegations of attempted match-fixing against the former Pakistan captain Salim Malik, themselves accepted money from an Indian bookmaker for apparently providing innocuous information.

``Of itself, what Waugh and Warne did was only borderline-reprehensible,'' says Engel. ``My own hunch is that it was a sting that went wrong: The bookmaker using old spymasters' techniques, tried to draw them into a web of deceit from which there could be no escape, but was far too unsubtle.''PTI adds: Attempts to contact Dalmiya in Calcutta resulted in his office replying: ``He has no comment to make.''

The British media, however, described the call by Wisden for Dalmiya's resignation as `unjustified'. The Times said the cricketing Bible's Suggestion was `contentious'.

Media reports said though the cricketers almanac hit the stands on All Fools Day, ``there remained something reassuring about Wisden, but that is not to say peaceand harmony reign on every page.''

Wisden charged that though Dalmiya had managed to head ICC he had `given the game no leadership whatsoever'.

It also heavily criticised the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) by alleging the ``spectre of apartheid in English club cricket'' and this was described by British media as the ``controversial passage in the book''.Wisden said in countless places where Asian cricketers dominated like Essex, Asian clubs were unable to arrange fixtures with white clubs and had to settle for setting up parallel cricketing groups to match each other.However, ECB took exception to such charges, with its spokesman Richard Peel saying ``current evidence did not suggest that a system of discrimination operated with the game in the United Kingdom.''