In his memoirs titled 'The Close of Play', Ponting said he didn't understand why Tendulkar vouched for Harbhajan during the appeal hearing but did not say anything when match referee Mike Procter initially suspended the spinner for passing allegedly racial comments at Aussie allrounder Andrew Symonds.
"I couldn't understand why Sachin didn't tell this to (match referee) Mike Procter in the first place," Ponting, captain of Australia at that time, wrote on the role of Tendulkar, who will retire after playing his 200th Test next month.
Harbhajan was accused of calling Symonds a 'monkey' during the 2008 Sydney Test and was suspended for three Tests. But he was cleared in an appeal hearing, conducted by Justice John Hansen from New Zealand, in which Tendulkar appeared as a witness and gave a statement in favour of the Indian.
Like Ponting, retired wicketkeeper Adam Gilchrist question Tendulkar's role in his autobiography five years ago.
"Owing to an administrative error, the judge was never told about any of Harbhajan's past offences, which meant the penalty was way less than what it should have been," Ponting was quoted as saying in excerpts published by Daily Telegraph.
Like Ponting, Hussey also raised doubts over Sachin's role as 'conciliator' in the controversy in his autobiography 'Underneath the South Cross'.
"A player with the stature of Sachin Tendulkar could have taken control of the crisis and acted as conciliator, standing above it all, so highly was he respected. But for reasons of his own, he chose not to," Hussey writes.
"Perhaps Sachin wasn't a God, just another human like the rest of us," the Chennai Super Kings southpaw went on to add.
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