Pakistan’s Minister of Information and Broadcasting, Fawad Ahmed Chaudhry has confirmed that Pakistan will not be airing Indian Premier League (IPL) 2019 matches, starting March 23.
The decision comes afterIndia’s official broadcaster of Pakistan Super League (PSL), DSports, pulledout from broadcasting the Twenty20 games midway through the recently-concludedfourth season held between February 14 and March 17.
Also,India-based producers of PSL, IMG Reliance also pulled out from producing as amark of protest against the attack against Indian Central Reserve Police Force(CRPF) personnel in Pulwama on February 14.
“Duringthe PSL, the way the Indian companies and the government treated Pakistancricket… after that, we can’t tolerate that IPL is shown in Pakistan,”Fawad Ahmed Chaudhry told a Pakistan news channel.
Chaudhry insisted thatPakistan wanted to keep sports away from politics but that they were forced toban broadcasting of IPL matches due to the stance taken by the Indiangovernment and the Indian cricket team following the Pulwama attack.
Notably, Pakistan CricketBoard (PCB) urged the International Cricket Council (ICC) to take actionagainst the Indian cricket team for sporting military caps during an ODI in afive-match series against Australia. Chaudhry had alleged that India tried topoliticise cricket by wearing army caps.
“We tried to keeppolitics and cricket apart but then the Indian cricket team played matcheswearing army caps against Australia. There was no action taken against that. Ifeel if IPL is not shown in Pakistan it will be a loss for IPL and Indiancricket. We are a cricketing superpower in international cricket,”Chaudhry added.
Asection of the Indian cricket fraternity had also urged the India cricket teamto boycott the 2019 World Cup match against Pakistan scheduled for June 16 inManchester.
Only recently, former Indiacaptain Gautam Gambhir opined jawans are more important than cricket and thatTeam India should be mentally prepared to forfeit the World Cup tie againstPakistan.
“You should then beready to face any eventuality, if they fail to reach the semi-final or have toplay Pakistan in the final. If you let go of that World Cup final then the countryshould be ready for it. There should not be any backlash. Certain sections ofthe society then start saying that you should not mix sports with politics. Forme though, jawans are far more important than two points,” Gambhir said. Agencies