CricDigs Blogs

At a time when the entire nation is shaken up by what has transpired at Mumbai terror strikes, the PCB chief, Ijaz Butt, has resorted to promote his selfish interests ahead, totally insensitive to the trauma that our nation is going through. This was on the third day of the anti-terror operations being executed in Mumbai when Mr. Butt went on to comment that now India ‘should’ definitely visit Pakistan for the scheduled tour of January 2009. He has somehow connected this with the fact that a bilateral series between the two nations would serve to act as a deterrent to the terrorists.

He had the audacity to make this statement at a time, when every second news channel was making it clear that in all probability the attack on Mumbai’s heart had a very strong Pakistani connection!! Just to make it clear — I too don’t want to mix politics with the sport but to actually hint at the fact that India and Pakistan offered the same kind of risk when it came to foreign tours being hosted and then to somehow manipulate what was happening at Mumbai into something that would get PCB out of its financial crisis — a series with India, seems a bit too insensitive.

What sort of mental make-up would the Indian team have if they are forced to tour Pakistan? The current and ongoing investigations are all pointing to the presence of our neighbours in the attack on Mumbai. Can we really expect the players to go on and play in Pakistan barely a month after these happenings, when their conscience must be pricking them hard? The least the PCB chief could have done was to offer condolences to those who lost someone in their family or even out-rightly condemn the attack. But what did he choose to do? Just use the unfortunate series of events that struck Mumbai to make sure that somehow the BCCI is forced to send its players, being aware that many of the senior members of the Indian team had expressed their unhappiness with touring the troubled interiors of Pakistan.