Ganguly takes India to the brink

Pakistan made life difficult for themselves with some wasteful batting as they could only add 35 to their overnight total - they were bowled out for 247 before lunch.

And, despite three wickets from the impressive Shoaib Akhtar, a half-century from Wasim Jaffer and a fluent unbeaten 48 from Sourav Ganguly took India to 171 for three before the umpires brought the players off.

Resuming their second innings on 212 for five, Pakistan lost wicketkeeper Kamran Akmal in the first over of the day and never recovered as Zaheer Khan and Ganguly took two wickets apiece to restrict the tourists' lead to 202.

Akmal (21) edged a delivery from Zaheer to point and Sohail Tanvir (13) was next to go when he skied an attempted pull off Zaheer to Harbhajan Singh at square leg.

Ganguly removed Misbah-ul-Haq (45) and Mohammed Sami (five) thanks to some injudicious strokes before Danish Kaneria was run out for a duck as Pakistan collapsed to 247 all out - a lead of 202.

However, India could not negotiate a tricky period before lunch as Shoaib found the edge of Dinesh Karthik's bat to dismiss the opener for one and leave India on three for one.

But there were also some fine strokes among the nerves, in particular a back-foot drive from Dravid which brought him four runs off the bowling of Sami.

Jaffer looked comfortable against Kaneria as a flick through mid-wicket for four, which took Pakistan to 76 for one, demonstrated. And the opener brought up his ninth Test half-century with a back-foot punch for four off Shoaib.

Sachin Tendulkar (32 not out) also got into the act late on, taking a particular liking to Sami, but India could not accelerate the rate sufficiently to seal victory on day four.