Press Trust of India
Karachi, Nov 21: BCCI official Rajeev Shukla who is also the chairman of the IPL governing council has advised the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to start developing a ‘safe venue’ at home instead of continuing to play its ‘home’ series in UAE.
“If Pakistan continues to play in UAE its cricket will slowly suffer. Lahore can easily be made into a safe venue,” Shukla said on Geo News channel Saturday. “If PCB makes Lahore a safe venue by constructing a team hotel near it and by providing adequate security then India will have no objection to playing in Lahore,” he added.
But Shukla was quick to clarify that India would be willing to play in Lahore if Pakistan gave the ICC proper security assurances and other member boards also had no objections to play there. “If Lahore is made a safe venue than everyone will come and play there,” said the BCCI vice-president.
Shukla reminded about the MoU signed between the two boards last year admitted that it was signed when someone else headed the ICC and BCCI. “Now the current BCCI president wants Pakistan and India to play against each other but in each other’s countries,” he pointed out.
“We are saying, come and play in India…we are ready to compensate for the home series losses we will give bigger participation fees and when things improve in Pakistan we will go there and play one or two series. We have no issues,” asserted Shukla.
Shukla to a question insisted there was nothing wrong in Pakistan playing in India in December as India would provide adequate security and also compensate the PCB well. “I don’t think this is such a big issue … why make an ego issue of it and insist on playing in Dubai only,” he stated.
When reminded that other teams had no objections to playing in Dubai or at other venues in UAE, Shukla said the BCCI had its own policies. own policy. We don’t care about what other countries do and about their policies. We have our own policies,” pointed out Shukla. “We want resumption of cricket ties with Pakistan… but not only on their (Pakistan) terms.”
Pressure on BCCI
Karachi: A top official of PCB said Saturday that there is pressure from the international cricket community on the BCCI to honour the MoU signed with the PCB last year. Najam Sethi, who was chairman of the PCB when the MoU was signed last year to play six bilateral series between 2015 and 2023 also informed that there were also plans to invite a Commonwealth team to Pakistan. “I can tell you this that the President of ECB is scheduled to meet with Shashank Manohar in Dubai this weekend,” Sethi said. Giles is helping us in our issues because he is also head of the task force on Pakistan cricket in the ICC and is working on bringing a Commonwealth team to Pakistan,” Sethi said.
