Cricket Australia yesterday pulled Hindi adverts displayed during the series with India after being alerted that they could be promoting tobacco, which would attract big fines for breaching local laws.

Cricket bosses said they were assured by the Indian government that the signage was advertising a brand of mouthwash, but decided to take them down due to their apparent similarity to a brand of chewing tobacco.
"We asked (the Indian government's) advice because we are not familiar with the Hindi language," a Cricket Australia spokesman told reporters.

"They came back and said it's an Indian mouthwashu00a0-- or at least they said it's not a tobacco product. We don't have one million percent certainty about all of the detail. It appears that there is a tobacco company with the same or similar brand name to the product that is being advertised. We have just become uneasy about it and said, let's withdraw this. It's better to be safe than sorry," he added.