The controversy surrounding Virat Kohli’s abusive behaviour with an Indian journalist at the end of a practice session on Tuesday refused to subside despite the team management’s efforts to play it down with protests being registered with the ICC and BCCI about the episode.

The BCCI secretary Anurag Thakur said that it was a case of misunderstanding and the issue should be put to rest immediately to let the team focus on the World Cup. “He (Kohli) has clarified on the issue. For India, the ongoing World Cup is very important. We need to put all these issues to rest and (Virat) has indirectly communicated that he misunderstood the situation. Let’s put this matter to an end,” Thakur said when asked about the incident.

“In future I think these kinds of incidents should be avoided. I have not spoken to the players yet, the team management is there, taking care of all the players’ needs,” said the 40-year-old, who was elected as BCCI secretary at the board’s AGM held in Chennai on Sunday.

The team management issued a brief statement, “there was a misunderstanding and no abusive language was used. Virat has spoken to the concerned gentleman immediately and matter ends.”

However, The Hindustan Times, whose reporter (Jasvinder Sidhu) was abused by Kohli — he mistook him for The Indian Express’ national sports editor Sandeep Dwivedi — has registered protests with the ICC and the BCCI.

Dwivedi had written a story titled, ‘In India’s jumbo touring party, the ‘G’ in WAGS too. The story, which appeared in the edition dated July 19, 2014, mentioned the fact that the BCCI had given permission to Virat Kohli to have his girlfriend, Bollywood actress Anushka Sharma, around while on tour in England.

HT sports editor Sukhwant Basra said: “I have written a letter to the BCCI president Jagmohan Dalmiya after consulting our Editor-in-Chief. I have asked Dalmiya to look into the incident. The reporter in question, Jasvinder Sidhu, has also informed the ICC about the incident.”