Three harrowing weeks after he was pronounced guilty of racial abuse by a match referee more inclined to making a value judgement than following the letter of the law, Harbhajan Singh allowed himself a broad smile once his three-Test ban was set aside by Justice John Hansen on Tuesday. After a four-hour hearing, the ICC Appeals Commissioner found no substance in the charge of racial abuse against the Indian off-spinner, instead holding him culpable of using offensive language in the face of strong provocation and fining him 50 percent of his match fee. It brought the curtains down on one of the most unsavoury periods in cricket history. It also vindicated the Indian stance proclaiming Harbhajan's innocence, Hansen's strong rebuke of Andrew Symonds for lack of sportsmanship and grace in some ways was the icing on the cake. Of course, it is more than likely that, had Hansen been made aware of the suspended one-Test ban on Harbhajan in November 2001 for dissent, he would have plumped for the severest penalty for breaching Clause 2.8 of the Code of Conduct, a one-Test or two-ODI ban. In that sense, the off-spinner was perhaps a little fortunate, but given the trauma of the last three weeks, that break was perhaps no more than he deserved.

What cricket did not deserve was the myopic approach adopted by the Australians in the first place, complemented by Mike Procter’s baffling sentence in the absence of any worthwhile evidence. In no sphere of life can racism in any form be condoned, and least of all in high-profile sport, whose protagonists are role models for millions of young kids. That said, a little more prudence and common sense would have ensured that what happened on the field, and with no racist connotation whatsoever, was settled amicably on it. Anil Kumble showed foresight in visualising exactly how the situation would snowball. Ricky Ponting, his aggrieved players who have a history of run-ins with Harbhajan, and a South African match referee who has lived through the Apartheid days, didn’t share that same wisdom.

The unfortunate happenings of the past few days bear the potential of totally eliminating on-field dialogue between players, what with the racism cross hanging heavily overhead. Sport is an entertainment industry, at the end of the day; in making robots out of human beings, entertainment will be the first casualty, a lesson that should not be lost either on officialdom, or on the players themselves.