The COVID-19 pandemic has created a huge financial stress in the sports industry with fixtures being suspended or postponed across the globe and cricket’s largest governing body the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has also suffered the wrath of it.
However, that hasn’t deterred the BCCI from cutting the wage of its high-paid cricketers – something which all the major boards and organisations have opted for.
BCCI’s centrally contracted international cricketers are likely to get their salary unscathed by the crisis, as confirmed by the treasurer Arun Dhumal.
“That would be the last thing that we would want to do at our end. That is why we are working (on) how much is the loss finally we have to pay. So once we are able to assess that then we might consider it, but it will be the last thing on our agenda,” Dhumal said as quoted by India Today on Tuesday.
Earlier in April, Dhumal had reiterated the Indian board’s stance on not deducting the high profile cricketers’ salaries. On being asked about it, he had assured that the BCCI would go about the issue in a way that nobody was affected.
“Any step taken needs to be thought out and right now we haven’t even thought about it. Obviously this is a big setback, but we will go about this in a way that nobody gets affected. These things can be discussed once things settle down,” Dhumal was quoted as saying by IANS.
But the high wages of the international cricketers during the ongoing crisis seem to have come at the cost of domestic and age-level players.
According to a report by the Indian Express, around 950 domestic cricketers are waiting for their share of arrears from Indian cricket’s annual earnings. The report further claimed that there were several other cricketers who had not yet received their last season’s match fees.
The plight has not limited itself to the cricketers only as the umpires and match officials are undergoing a similar fate. Reportedly, the officials have not been paid their dues from matches played in January, February and March.
The reason given, in this case, has been the hardship caused by the nationwide lockdown. But the board has failed to explain why the dues before the lockdown period were not paid.