LAHORE: Amid the Bharatiya Janata Party government’s staunch stance of not sending its national cricket team to Pakistan, questions are arising about whether the Indian side or their captain Rohit Sharma will come to the neighbouring country to attend the opening ceremony of the Champions Trophy which is an ICC event.
The Champions Trophy will be held in Pakistan from Feb 19 to March 9.
India, due to political strains with Pakistan, has not played any bilateral cricket with Pakistan since 2012-13 when a Misbah-ul-Haq-led squad toured India for a white-ball series. While no Indian team has toured Pakistan after the 2008 Asia Cup, Pakistan teams in the meantime have been travelling to India for different ICC events.
To accommodate India in the eight-nation Champions Trophy, a two-way hybrid model has been adopted recently by the ICC with the consent of the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) and the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) to hold all the Champions Trophy matches involving India in Dubai.
Under the same model, the Green-shirts will also not travel to India for any future ICC event in which India will hold Pakistan’s matches at a neutral venue.
According to sources, the Indian media has sent several queries to the PCB in order to confirm if the BCCI or the International Cricket Council had contacted the PCB in this regard.
However, the PCB has not received any such request despite the fact it had already conveyed to the ICC to submit the names of the squads of all participating countries including players, coaching staff and other officials to help them in issuing Pakistani visas timely.
