TOI
 
New Delhi, Feb 18: After getting an offer from the Communist Party of India (Marxist) to join the party in West Bengal, former India cricket captain Sourav Ganguly is being wooed to fight the coming elections from Uttar Pradesh, but he has not taken any decision, his wife, Dona indicated on Tuesday.

But later in Kolkata Ganguly said that he was not good enough for politics. "It is not true. I am not good enough for politics," Ganguly said when asked about a report of the possibility of his joining politics. Asked about reports that he planned to join Samajwadi Party, Ganguly quipped, "I have my own state."

"The West Bengal government definitely wants that he (Sourav) should step into politics and when I was in Lucknow for a programme, some minister who was there said that he should come and fight from UP," Dona earlier said, but she was not sure whether it was the ruling Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) which made the offer.

"Such offers keep coming but Sourav has not yet decided." Asked which party wanted to offer a ticket to Sourav, Dona said "I don't remember, I think Samajwadi Party although I may be wrong. Since I am not into politics I don't exactly know the names of people in politics. But I think it was SP."

SP leader Amar Singh, however, said that "Nobody from our side has officially gone to Dona Ganguly. If someone went on our behalf, I don't know about it. But if Ganguly wants to join SP, we will consider ourselves lucky."

Sourav has already been invited by the ruling coalition in his home state to fight the coming elections on a CPI (M) ticket. But Sourav said that he was not interested as he would be busy playing the Indian Premier League captaining the Kolkata Knight Riders besides attending to other pre-determined engagements.

When asked whether Sourav knows about this Uttar Pradesh offer, Dona said "No, the offer has not reached him. The minister told me a day before yesterday when I was in Lucknow for a programme. Sourav is not interested but our state government has already indicated that he should join."

But Dona herself is apparently not averse to the idea. "Personally I feel he is a good leader but it's his decision as to what he will do," she said when asked what she wanted.

"Sourav has always believed in nurturing emerging talent. He has been doing so throughout his cricketing career. He wishes to continue this work by opening a cricket academy where young talent can be groomed to produce world class players", Dona said.

Dona also said that her husband plans to open "a chain of schools, affiliated to a reputed board of secondary education like the ICSE or the CBSE". "We hail from a family where education is considered very important. Sourav wants to do his bit in this direction also", she said.

Declining to speak on the numerous controversies that had marked the over-a-decade-long career of the cricketer, Dona said, "my area of excellence is entirely different from that of my husband. But both of us share a common trait that is the ability to appreciate talent and merit".