Kolkata, March 27 (IANS): West Bengal Sports Minister Madan Mitra Thursday batted for former India captain Sourav Ganguly to take over as the country's cricket board chief, hours after the Supreme Court proposed cricket legend Sunil Gavaskar as its interim president replacing incumbent N. Srinivasan.

“Who better that Sourav? Sourav means clean cricket, Sourav means youth and energy. If the SC wants to know about Sourav’s credentials for the post, the people of Bengal will vouch for that by hitting the streets,” Mitra told media persons.

“Sourav symbolises integrity, he played cricket for so many years but never ever did his name crop up in any kind of fixing or the like. There is no better choice than him,” added Mitra.

Making scathing remarks against Srinivasan, a bench headed by Justice A.K. Patnaik proposed the name of former cricketer and commentator Sunil Gavaskar to head the Board of Control for Cricket in India during the pendency of the case in the apex court.

While Gavaskar said he was ready for the “challenge”, another former India captain Bishan Singh Bedi suggested that BCCI's ex-chief Shashank Manhohar should replace Srinivasan.