“He (Srinivasan) was utterly disappointed with the Eden strip and asked CAB to convince Mukherjee to fall in line, else the BCCI would be compelled to take harsh action against the association -- like not granting any match to this venue. CAB was out of favour for a long time. After burying the hatchet with BCCI, we cannot afford to take them on again,” a top CAB official told MiD DAY yesterday.

“Srinivasan even said that these sort of wickets will not help India capitalise on home conditions; this won’t be tolerated. He said, ‘either convince him or sack him’,” the official added.

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The CAB will decide on whether to talk to the 83-year-old curator or replace him, but for the moment, it appears that Mukherjee will be around till the India-Pakistan one-dayer scheduled for January 3. “We will talk to him, but he won’t budge. We have no other option. As of now, he is here till January 3, after which he may not be the Eden curator anymore,” he revealed.

It may be recalled that the octogenarian defied instructions during the preparation of the Eden wicket before the third Test against England. He asked for a written order from the BCCI to prepare a rank turner from Day One. The episode saw Mukherjee calling India skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s demand as “immoral and illogical”.

Mukherjee also had similar problems with Kolkata Knight Riders skipper Gautam Gambhir, who was not happy with the pitch for their home matches during the last IPL.