Sachin Tendulkar [Images] remains the highest-ranked Indian batsman at joint-13th, even as Rahul Dravid [Images], Virender Sehwag [Images], Sourav Ganguly [Images] and V V S Laxman [Images] slipped a rung each, in the ICC [Images] Test rankings issued on Tuesday.

• Complete Rankings

Tendulkar, however, shares his place with England [Images] right-hand batsman Ian bell [Images], who scored a career-best 199 in the drawn first Test against South Africa at Lord's.

• Bell comes of age as Test batsman

The knock helped Bell rise nine places.

However, the other Indians in the top-20 slipped, with Dravid going down a place to 15th. Same was the case with Sehwag, Ganguly and Laxman, who dropped a spot to 18, 19 and 20 respectively.

Meanwhile, Kevin Pietersen [Images] rose three places to seven, his highest ranking this year.

The batting list is still headed by Kumar Sangakkara of Sri Lanka [Images]. He is followed by the West Indies' [Images] Shivnarine Chanderpaul [Images], Mike Hussey of Australia and his captain Ricky Ponting [Images], along with Mohammad Yousuf [Images] of Pakistan, the latter two sharing fourth place.

In the bowling list, Anil Kumble [Images] is the highest-placed Indian at eight followed by Zaheer Khan [Images] at joint-14th. Controversial off-spinner Harbhajan Singh [Images] is 18th.