Did I hear that right? - Media myth: Indian cricket team does not have bench strength

First of all - what does bench strength really mean, and which of the teams should we say has a decent bench strength? Is it -
Australia - who lost 5/5 matches when their top players (Gilchrist, Ponting, Hayden, McGrath) were not playing?? or
South Africa - who took almost 4 years (2000 - 2004) to rebuild after they lost their key players (Cronje, Symcox, Cullinan, Donald)? or
New Zeland - whose 11 players I bet many of us can't name without a little help? or
Sri Lanka - who went into a deep crisis for almost 2 years (2004 - 2006), they were # 7 in the ODI rankings? or
West Indies - who everyone knows never came close to the 1975/1979 team? or
Pakistan - who lose all the key players after a WC loss, goes into oblivion for a few years, flatters only to deceive later? or
England - with question marks in the playing 11 - leave alone the bench?
That leaves Bangladesh, Kenya, Zimbabwe, Ireland, Netherlands, Scotland, Canada - off all teams playing in the WC. We're not comparing our bench strenght against these teams, are we?

Here's something to chew on for all "India does not have bench strength" skeptics. How many times have you followed a Ranji, Duleep or Deodhar trophy match to see our "bench strength"?
Well, to make you less embarassed about yourself - here are a few names.

Other than the ones we know;
Raina, Kaif, Dinesh Mongia, Venugopal Rao (all bastmen)
Dinesh Karthik (wkt batsman)
RP Singh, Piyush Chawla and Joginder Singh (all bowlers),
there are some other exceptional talents that you might not have heard of. These players have had a sensational run over the past few months. They've performed exceptionally well in the domestic as well as international circuits (A and under-19 teams); many a times solely responsible for their team's success.

1. Manoj Tiwari
Age	Matches	Runs	HS	Ave
21	15	1150	210*	57.5
2. Shikhar Dhawan
Age	Matches	Runs	HS	Ave
21	36	1388	131*	44.77
3. Gaurav Dhiman
Age	Matches	Runs	HS	Ave
20	7	119	94*	19.83
Star of the under 19 - used to open batting and bowling
4. Cheteshwar-Pujara
Age	Matches	Runs	HS	Ave
19	12	789	177	43.83
5. YK Pathan
Age	Matches	Runs	HS	Ave	Wickets	Best	Ave
24	21	828	92*	31.84	53	6 for 47	32.22
6. Ambati Rayudu
Age	Matches	Runs	HS	Ave
21	47	2715	210	39.92
7. S Badrinath
Age	Matches	Runs	HS	Ave
26	47	3128	206*	48.12
8. Mithun Manhas
Age	Matches	Runs	HS	Ave
27	83	4722	193	42.16
9. Murali Vijay
Age	Matches	Runs	HS	Ave
22	7	628	179	52.33

Plus - here are some stars of the current under-19 team that the coaches are raving about:

Batsmen
10. Virat Kohli - 18
11. Tanmay Srivastava - 17
12. Ajinkya Rahane - 18
13. Parvez Aziz - 19
14. Bodapati Sumanth - 18
Bowlers
15. Vijaykumar Yo Mahesh - 19
16. Ishant Sharma - 18
17. Abu Nechim - 18 18. Shahbaz Nadeem - 17

Hence, with these 27 names (18 above and the 9 others that I'm assuming many of us already know of) - lets stop kidding ourselves when we say "India does not have bench strength".

These players need to be given a bigger opportunity - atleast a recognition, and that won't happen as long as we keep worshipping the current players. The entire country mourned for over a year when Ganguly was ousted from the team. There will be similar uproar over some other player being ousted 2 years later, the player will hence be forcefully selected in key matches, won't perform and will become a subject of effigy burning, chappal beating and other crazy acts - and then we'll say "India does not have a good bench strength". This is a vicious cycle - that will never allow a "bench strength" to be recognized, let alone be developed. And adding fuel to the fire is the tabloid Indian media.

Media - please stop being a tabloid, you're not doing the country any good by being so.