Chairman of Pakistan Cricket Board Ramiz Raja ( Twitter )
Recognizing that it was Indian money that was, in a way, keeping the Pakistan Cricket Board suspended and PCBs new chairman Ramiz Raja said India’s financial dominance in the cricket game was the reason no other ICC member country could go against India.
In that state of affairs, Raja told a Senate Standing Committee that the Indian government can trigger a collapse of the PCB if it were so liable.
The PCB gets 50 percent of its funding from the ICC. The International Cricket Council conducts tournaments and the income generated from them is distributed among its member boards, Raja told the panel.
Now, 90% of the ICC funding is generated from the Indian market. In other words, Indian business houses are running Pakistan cricket. If tomorrow, the Indian Prime Minister decides that they will not fund Pakistan cricket, there’s a possibility that the PCB can collapse, Ramiz Raja added.
The PCB has been left stranded in recent times with New Zealand and England quitting tours to the country. The Kiwis, in fact, had arrived in Pakistan but decided to fly home literally minutes before the first One-Day International instance unspecified security threats.
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Pakistan’s Interior Minister Sheikh Rashid had claimed a conspiracy in this concern, claiming that the emails threatening the New Zealand team originated from accounts that were based in India.
No international cricket took place in Pakistan for more than a decade after a terrorist attack on the guest Sri Lankan team in Lahore. Also, there has been no bilateral series for a decade and a half against India, the biggest attraction for any host country same as for Pakistan – due to bitter relations between the two countries.
PCB has been keen for a long time about being isolated at the ICC, that no other country has supported it despite the country undertaking several tours over the last year and a half during the global pandemic. In fact, England’s tour of Pakistan was considered a return goodwill gesture for last year’s tour of the United Kingdom, during which players had to remain in a strict bio-bubble when the coronavirus was raging in that country.
India, England, and Australia are informally dubbed the ‘Big Three’ in the ICC as no major decision – financial or cricketing – can be implemented without their nod. Many in Pakistan see the country’s isolation in the world body as a result of India flexing its muscles.
Australia will not stand up to them (India). No country will stand up to them. You saw what happened – they (New Zealand) packed up and left in two minutes. That’s because they don’t have their own interest in playing in Pakistan, as our cricketing economy is not that strong, Raja told the Senate Standing Committee.
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