There is palpable indignation in the top echelon of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) with the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chief Shahryar Khan rushing to the media in Pakistan and announcing every detail of the conversation and correspondence exchanged between the two Boards; and even giving a unsavoury twist to a handful of points discussed impromptu.
The BCCI president Shashank Manohar had to sort of dispute and clarify statements made by Khan at Karachi on Saturday in connection with the way to execute the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) that entails a two-Test and five-match ODI series in the UAE next month.
“There is no question of having extended an invitation to Pakistan. We have not even approached the Indian Government. All we have asked is whether Pakistan is willing to play in India,” reiterated Manohar, talking to The Hindu on Sunday.
The embarrassing situation caused by the PCB chief in the last one month and his tendency to talk off hand to the local media has not gone down well with the BCCI; it has even brought into the dialogue process ECB representative, Giles Clarke.
BCCI sources in Mumbai revealed that the Englishman has impressed upon Khan at least twice in the last one month, including on Saturday evening (Nov. 14), the value of keeping the parleys between the BCCI and PCB as a “close door” affair and bring it to the public domain only after the entire process of dialogue and an understanding between the two Boards has reached its culmination.
Apart from being the ECB representative on the ICC, Clarke is also Chairman of the ICC Finance and Commercial Affairs Committee, member, ICC Nominations Committee, ICC Executive Committee.
The BCCI chief has stuck his neck out showing determination to go ahead with the bilateral series in India (not in Pakistan and UAE) and gave his idea of reviving the India-Pakistan series to the AGM member here on Monday (Nov. 9).
The lawyer-turned administrator from Nagpur elected for the second term as BCCI president, Manohar has taken some initiatives to set the BCCI house in order following an administration upheaval caused by continual detrimental news of the BCCI’s functioning in the last few years, with the IPL taking a major hit on the integrity quotient.
With the PCB chief Khan raising the MoU issue every second day, Manohar also demonstrated his readiness to go ahead with the series, but in India; preferably in Northern and Eastern venues. Sources told this newspaper that the BCCI has only talked about playing the series in India and offering participation money, and that it has not discussed security matters and sharing revenue from television broadcasting.
“All this will come only after PCB agrees to play the series in India and after the Indian government gives its nod,” Manohar said. The PCB chief was supposed to have reverted to the BCCI on Saturday evening, it’s not happened so far. The BCCI is waiting for the call.
