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Legendary India cricketer Ravichandran Ashwin was critical of former IPL chairman Lalit Modi for releasing the video of Harbhajan Singh slapping S Sreesanth during the inaugural season of IPL back in 2008. Harbhajan slapping Sreesanth in an IPL match is still considered as one of the most controversial moments in the tournament's history. The former spinner has expressed regret over the incident multiple times and the two have long moved on from it.
However, Modi recent reignited the controversy by releasing an unseen video of the incident in a pocast with former Australia captain Michael Clarke. Both of them faced a lot of scrutiny for doing so especially after the players had already moved on. Sreesanth's wife also joined in on the criticism and labelled the release of the video as a disgraceful act that affected their family.
Ashwin believes that there is no reason to release a video of an incident which everyone already knows about. The 38-year-old further pointed out how Harbhajan had admitted his mistake and both the players had already buried the hatchet.
“It is the head of the anaconda that keeps on rising. In the modern day and age, footage and videos are everywhere. I just feel it is not a proud moment for both of them. I don’t wish to address too much about it. The incident is over. Everyone knows about it. Harbhajan came to our podcast and spoke about how he felt. Yes, you made a mistake, and you need to live with it for the rest of your life," Ashwin said on his YouTube channel.
"But you need to move on, too. Some folks may have done something like this at home and so the outside world would not know about it. I don’t wish to accuse anyone. The less we speak about it, the better. Anyone who makes a mistake, when they get a chance to move on, they take that chance," he added.
Harbhajan also reacted to the video's release
Meanwhile, the Harbhajan-Sreesanth slapgate video ended up receiving a lot of attention once it was released by Modi for the world to see. Harbhajan himself reacted to the clip surfacing years after the incident and accused Modi of having a 'selfish motive'.
“The way the video has been leaked, it's wrong. It shouldn't have happened. They might have a selfish motive behind it. Something that happened 18 years ago, people have forgotten, and they are reminding people about it. I feel bad for whatever happened. We were playing, and everyone had things going on in their mind. Mistakes happened, and we do feel ashamed about it,” Harbhajan told Instant Bollywood.
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