Shanthakumaran Nair Sreesanth (pronunciationⓘ, born 6 February 1983) is an Indian former cricketer and film actor who played all formats of the game for his country.

[5] His brother Dipu Santhan owns a music company in Kochi and his eldest sister Nivedita is a television actress in Kerala.

Sreesanth's elder sister Divya married Madhu Balakrishnan, a famous South Indian playback singer.

On 12 December 2013, Sreesanth married his girlfriend Bhuvneshwari Kumari of Jaipur's Shekhawat family at Guruvayur Sri Krishna temple in Kerala.

This led to rumours that an astrologer had convinced him to take a break from competition to preserve his longevity in the sport, which Sreesanth categorically denied, maintaining that he was training only to regain his fitness.

[7] In November 2004, Sreesanth entered the record books when he took a hat-trick against Himachal Pradesh in a Ranji Trophy game.

[11] He performed impressively in that tournament, earning the Man of the Series award and being the leading wicket taker (7) with the third best bowling average.

After being punished early by Kumar Sangakkara and Sanath Jayasuriya, Sreesanth returned to claim his first two ODI wickets at the end of the match.

Sreesanth was selected for his first Test squad in the home series against England in March 2006, in place of Zaheer Khan.

After losing the limited-overs series 4–0, Sreesanth produced took 5–40 in a display of pace and swing to help dismiss South Africa.

He was fined after breaching the International Cricket Council's advertising logo policy, and also for "conduct contrary to the spirit of the game" after sending off Hashim Amla after dismissing him.

[23] Even though he went unpunished for the Nel incident, he was fined 30% of the match fee for running towards Hashim Amla after picking up his wicket, and wearing a branded garment under the jersey.

He was fined half of his match fee for deliberately shoulder barging England captain Michael Vaughan whilst walking back to his mark.

Soon afterwards, he bowled a no-ball where he overstepped the crease by roughly 2 feet (0.61 m), leading to speculation it was deliberate; the delivery was a bouncer to Paul Collingwood.

[24][25] After leaving out of the Indian team for about a year and half, Sreesanth was called back to play the home Test series against Sri Lanka in November 2009.

[28] In September 2007, Sreesanth joined the Indian team in South Africa for the inaugural ICC T-20 world cup following his omission for the one-day series in England.

Although his performance in the tournament lacked consistency, Sreesanth managed breakthroughs at critical junctures that were vital to his team's success.

During the semifinal match against Australia which India won, Sreesanth got the vital wickets of the Australian openers Adam Gilchrist and Matthew Hayden.

Harbhajan's team had lost their third consecutive match when he apparently reacted violently to Sreesanth approaching him and saying "hard luck".

The BCCI launched a separate investigation into the incident and decided to ban Harbhajan for five ODIs, deeming him to have broken the code of conduct in his national contract.

"[38] On 16 May 2013, the Delhi police arrested Sreesanth and two of his Rajasthan Royals teammates, Ajit Chandila and Ankeet Chavan from Mumbai, on charges of spot-fixing during IPL 6.

[39][40] Jiju Janardhan, another key figure accused of spot-fixing, is reported to be Sreesanth's cousin and an under-22 Gujarat player.

When the Delhi police team intercepted him, he was reportedly accompanied with a woman in a SUV outside a five-star hotel in Carter Road Promenade, Mumbai.

[43] Sreesanth, and the two other players accused of spot fixing had their Rajasthan Royals contracts suspended while their inquiries were pending.

In October 2009, the BCCI issued a final warning to Sreesanth that any repetition of his code of conduct violations might result in drastic actions such as a ban from domestic cricket.

[57] In November 2009, however, after more than 18 months of omission from the national team, Sreesanth was recalled to the Test squad for the first two matches against Sri Lanka.

While he formed close friendships with fellow housemates including season winner Dipika Kakar and Shivashish Mishra,[75] he frequently engaged in ugly fights with most of the other housemates and even guests including Season 11 contestant Vikas Gupta and threatened to leave the house 299 times.