Mumbai: Senior Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) functionary Najam Sethi has asked the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) for confirmation on playing any bilateral series with Pakistan.
“I met the BCCI President, Anurag Thakur on the sidelines of the ICC meeting in Capetown and asked him whether India wanted to play with Pakistan or not,” PCB’s former chairman and head of executive committee, Sethi, told the media in Lahore.
“He didn’t give a straight answer and in fact he has floated some ideas which it would not be fair to discuss at this forum now,” Sethi said.
The PCB official was firm to make clear at the ICC meeting that Pakistan will not accept any loan or grant as a compensation from India for not playing any series with Pakistan since the bilateral series of 2007.
“I told the ICC members that we had been suffering huge losses since the last nine years because India was just not ready to play with as as per the bilateral calender,” he added.
“I told them that because India was not playing with us we had suffered huge losses and it had hit our development plans for the sport in Pakistan,” Sethi stated.
He said that ICC is willing to form a committee of board members to review the existing cricket relations between the two nations.
“But we said such a committee would serve no purpose and it was the BCCI which must make a clear policy statement on playing with us in either bilateral series or ICC events. Thakur didn’t respond at the ICC meeting,” he said.
Sethi said that if India doesn’t plan on playing in the upcoming ICC events including the ICC Champions Trophy, India should be cleared about it. He also added that the match should be considered as forfeited by India and points should be awarded to Pakistan.
“We have told the ICC that if India does not want to play us in ICC events we have no issues only that the match points should be awarded to us and the matches considered forfeited by India,” he said.
ICC is willing to give monetary compensations to Pakistan as India is refusing to play any series with them, Sethi added.
“Giles Clarke will be giving a report to the ICC on how and how much the ICC can give to us but we have told them it should not be a loan or grant,” he said.
Sethi also exclaimed that Pakistan is already suffering as no Test nation is willing to tour Pakistan due to security concerns.
“Add to that the refusal of India to play us and we have told the ICC that we want a clear stance from the BCCI on playing with us but that has still not come from the Indian officials,” he said.
As per a reliable source from BCCI, the technical committee of the women’s cricket league was asked to decide future steps on India’s take of refusing to play Pakistan in bilateral series last October in UAE.
“The series in UAE was important since it will decide which four top teams qualify for the next women’s World Cup. The technical committee will now decide what to do whether to penalize India and award points to Pakistan,” he said.
The source said that Pakistan had agreed to play the series but India backed out saying that it had not got clearance from its government to play against Pakistan.