No playing cricket in India, declares Pak
NEW DELHI: The chances of reviving one of sport’s great rivalries virtually ended on Thursday after Pakistan denied its cricket team permission to play in India citing security concerns, scuttling plans for a proposed bilateral series in December.
The two countries are also unlikely to play in the United Arab Emirates as proposed by the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) because the Indian government is not expected to give permission due to the presence of al Qaeda and the Islamic State in west Asia.
“The Pakistani government position is that the PCB cannot play in India without the government’s permission, which has not been given. The government raised security and safety issues for the PCB regarding playing in India,” Najam Sethi, chief of the PCB’s executive committee, told HT.
Ties between the two cricket boards have soured in recent months over the BCCI’s dogged refusal to play in the UAE, which acts as the home venue for the Pakistan cricket team since the 2009 terror attack in Lahore on the visiting Sri Lanka team.
“I don’t know why India doesn’t want to play in the UAE. I t recently ( i n 2014) played IPL matches there. We are waiting for a fresh proposal from the BCCI. But our position is clear — we are not going to play in India,” Sethi insisted.
Talks between the two boards were called off in October after Shiv Sena workers stormed the BCCI’s Mumbai office ahead of a scheduled meeting between the two cricket chiefs, Shashank Manohar and Shaharyar Khan, dimming chances of renewing bilateral cricketing ties damaged in the wake of the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks.
The PCB had signed an MoU with the BCCI to play six bilateral series between 2015 and 2023. It claimed the BCCI agreed to play the first series in the UAE in December. Out of the six, four series will be hosted by Pakistan and the six tours will comprise up to 14 Tests, 30 ODIs and 12 T20s. “This is Pakistan’s home series which means the choice of venue is PCB’s right and all revenues accrue to PCB, just as when it is India’s home series in 2017, all revenues will accrue to BCCI and the venue will be India’s choice,” said Sethi. The PCB has threatened that if the BCCI failed to honour its commitment, the matter would be taken to the ICC. However, Manohar will soon take over as the ICC chairman. However, BCCI secretary, Anurag Thakur, said in Mumbai: “For any international event organised by ICC or ACC (Asian body), it’s up to them to decide the venue. For a bilateral series, it’s between the two nations to decide where they are comfortable.”