Praveen Kumar ran through the top-order as Paksitan, chasing a near-impossible 331 for a win, surrendered virtually without a fight to be dismissed for 190 in the tri-series contest at the Sher-e-Bangla Stadium here, handing India a huge 140-run win. Praveen returned figure of 4-53 as the top four batsmen fell to him, and Pakistan were virtually out of the contest by the end of the fifth over when they batted.
Pakistan lost three wickets with next to nothing on the scoreboard, and were never in the game after that.
Praveen Kumar removed Salman Butt, Younis Khan and Mohd Yousuf in rapid succession, and then Kamran Akmal also fell to him after using the long handle for a while.
Once Misbah-ul-Haq also departed, edging Ishant Sharma to skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni, the match was effectively over, as the slower bowlers led by Piyush Chawla (4-40) then wrapped up the rest of the batting.
Skipper Shoaib Malik scored a half-century, but was never convincing.
Earlier, Virender Sehwag (89) and Gautam Gambhir (62) put up 155 runs for the opening wicket as India finished at 330-8.
Yuvraj Singh also contributed 55 while Dhoni and Suresh Raina chipped in to add to the total, as the Paksitanis came up with one of their worst bowling performances in the recent years.
Umar Gul picked up three wickets but went for 61 runs, while the rest of the bowling ranged between the unimaginative and the pathetic.
Some attacking batting by the Indians, combined with some pathetic bowling and equally ridiculous captaincy by Malik saw India rattle up a potentially match-winning 330-8 in their tri-series game after Dhoni won the toss and elected to bat.
The only man not to get going was Yusuf Pathan, who made his One-day International debut.
The Pakistani bowlers completely lost their poise as the Indians went after them from the beginning of the innings. The fielding side was completely demoralised as the bowlers bowled all over -- short, wide and overpitched.
The lowest ebb came after left-arm seamer Wahab Riaz was ordered out of the attack by the umpires after he bowled two beamers.
Malik, in his wisdom, threw the ball to strike bowler Sohail Tanvir, ensuring that the IPL hero gets to bowl only 9.4 of his 10-over quota. Ultimately, it was left to Younis Khan to bowl the last over.
This was India's first game of the series, while Pakistan had already registered a 70-run win over hosts Bangladesh on Sunday.
India: Virender Sehwag, Gautam Gambhir, Yuvraj Singh, Rohit Sharma, Yusuf Pathan, MS Dhoni, Suresh Raina, Irfan Pathan, Piyush Chawla, Praveen Kumar, Ishant Sharma.
Pakistan: Salman Butt, Kamran Akmal, Younis Khan, Mohammad Yousuf, Shahid Afridi, Shoaib Malik, Misbah-ul-Haq, Sohail Tanvir, Umar Gul, Wahab Riaz, Iftikhar Anjum.
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