“This is completely unacceptable” – BCCI writes to ICC over anti-India banners issue

Team India is having a gala time on the field with all their stars firing at the right time. After the game against Sri Lanka, Virat Kohli’s men finished top of the points table and now they will take on New Zealand in semi-finals. Though the Blue team is enjoying their stay in England there have been issues regarding their safety which was clearly mentioned by the team management a couple of days ago. The situation escalated further when anti-India slogans were displayed during their tie against Lankan Lions.

Right from the start of the tournament the BCCI and ICC have differed with their statements regarding security concerns. A week ago there were reports that Indian players were perturbed by the fans in their private space. Even after asking for additional safety measures the ICC was not able to completely solve the issue and now the banner fiasco has further aggravated the security problems.

Politics collide with sports

It is not the first time that the Indian team has faced the heat of political tensions. Even before the start of their World Cup campaign, there was uproar regarding their match against neighbors Pakistan. Even in the game where Afghanistan was taking on Pakistan a banner reading “Justice for Balochistan” was displayed by an unnamed aircraft.

Again Headingley caught the attention for wrong reasons in the 44th game of World Cup when an aircraft caused a political stir by exhibiting unpleasantry slogans. This time the slogans were “Help End Mob Lynching in India” and “India stop Genocide, Free Kashmir.” Immediately BCCI took the matter to ICC and demanded quick actions against the perpetrators.

Writing to ICC, a BCCI official was quoted by The Indian Express as saying, “This is completely unacceptable. We have written to the ICC, raising our concerns about what happened in Headingley. If this kind of incident is repeated in the semi-finals, it will be really unfortunate. The safety and security of our players is paramount.”

In response, ICC conveyed their apologies and further expressed their disappointment on such actions. They confirmed the Indian team that they will work with West Yorkshire Police and take necessary steps and hope that such incidents will not happen in the knock-out stages.

“We are incredibly disappointed this has happened again. We do not condone any sort of political messages at the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup. Throughout the tournament, we have worked with local police forces around the country to prevent this type of protest occurring. After the previous incident, we were assured by West Yorkshire Police there would not be a repeat of this issue, so we are very dissatisfied it has happened again.”