There’s no easy answer to the question of whether politics should influence sports or not, but India and the BCCI seem to take special pleasure in muddling up the issue as much as possible.
The BCCI and state machinery in Rajkot could handle the threat from activist Hardik Patel, who threatened to disrupt the third ODI between India and South Africa over the issue of quotas for the Patel clan. But the ICC felt compelled to withdraw Aleem Dar from series after the Shiv Sena stormed the BCCI’s headquarters in Mumbai to protest the meeting between board president Shashank Manohar and his PCB counterpart Shahryar Khan, and also threatened to prevent Dar from standing in the fifth ODI on Sunday in Mumbai.
While BCCI secretary Anurag Thakur condemned the protest, saying “you can’t barge into BCCI premises and force people not to hold talks with the PCB chairman,” he also said the talks had been cancelled and there is no official meeting scheduled for Delhi instead, as some had suggested. Instead, Shahryar will meet Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, who still holds considerable sway in the board despite no longer being part of it.
Now these aren’t new tactics by the Shiv Sena. They famously dug up the pitch at the Wankhede Stadium in the 1990s to prevent a match between India and Pakistan from going ahead and is a situation the board should have foreseen. The issue of Pakistan playing India in cricket has been exploited for political gain for decades. With the BJP now in power and projecting India as a strong, regional power, the mileage to be gained from opposing anything to do with Pakistan is larger than ever.
Given that the BCCI is effectively run by politicians from across the political spectrum, the situation should never have been allowed to reach a point where umpires have to be withdrawn and commentators sent home (Shoaib Akhtar is reportedly headed back to Pakistan as well). Either the board should have ensured that the series had no link to Pakistan or it should have stood its ground and guaranteed that Dar and Akhtar would be properly protected.
The issue becomes more significant when you consider India is hosting the World T20 in March and the Asia Cup in February and both competitions include Pakistan. Mumbai is one of the venues for the World T20 as well (the venues for the Asia Cup are yet to be determined). Thakur, for one, has already voiced his concern.
“It is the responsibility of every Indian to ensure that every sports event held in the country passes off peacefully. We should also appreciate other teams if they play well against India,” he said.
But it raises the question that if India and BCCI cannot guarantee the safety of one umpire and a couple of commentators during a cricket series, can they can guarantee the safety of the entire Pakistan team? The corollary to that is if India believes it can guarantee the safety of the Pakistan team, then it should be able to protect Dar and company as well.
The other issue is the atmosphere under which Pakistan might have to play their cricket in India. The ICC’s statement withdrawing Dar from the series said, “under the present circumstances, it will be unreasonable to expect from Aleem that he will be able to perform his duties to the best of his abilities.”
By that logic, it would also be unreasonable to expect the Pakistan team to play to the best of its abilities under similar pressure.
The BCCI touts itself as the leading light of the sport of cricket. It believes its leadership is vital to the health and continued vitality of the game. But to do that, it must also show leadership when it is least convenient. The Indian government clearly had no objections to Dar umpiring in the series, or with Akhtar and Wasim Akram acting as commentators. Provided Dar was still willing to stand in the game, this was a chance for the board to show it would not back down in the face of extremists.
That it did not raises the risk that next time these extremists will be emboldened to carry their protests even further and makes you wonder whether India should be hosting World Cups when it does not embrace the world.