Rohit, Virat remain in top bracket; Kishan, Iyer dropped from BCCI central contracts
New Delhi, Feb 28: Skipper Rohit Sharma and star batter Virat Kohli retained their place in the top bracket but the out-of-favour duo of Ishan Kishan and Shreyas Iyer were excluded after ignoring the directive to play Ranji Trophy as the BCCI unveiled its centrally-contracted players for this year on Wednesday.
Rohit, Kohli, Jasprit Bumrah and Ravindra Jadeja figured in the A plus category, the highest bracket of the BCCI's central contracts list.
"Please note that Shreyas Iyer and Ishan Kishan were not considered for the annual contracts in this round of recommendations," said the BCCI in a statement.
"The BCCI has recommended that all athletes give precedence to participating in domestic cricket during periods when they are not representing the national team," the statement added.
Six cricketers feature in the A category, including R Ashwin, Mohammed Shami, Mohammed Siraj, KL Rahul, Shubman Gill and Hardik Pandya.
Suryakumar Yadav, Rishabh Pant, Kuldeep Yadav, Axar Patel and Yashasvi Jaiswal have got B category contracts.
As many as 15 have been handed C category contracts including Rinku Singh, Tilak Verma, Ruturaj Gaekwad, Shardul Thakur, Shivam Dube, Ravi Bishnoi, Jitesh Sharma, Washington Sundar, Mukesh Kumar, Sanju Samson, Arshdeep Singh, KS Bharat, Prasidh Krishna, Avesh Khan and Rajat Patidar.
The selection committee has also recommended fast bowling contracts for Akash Deep, Vijaykumar Vyshak, Umran Malik, Yash Dayal and Vidwath Kaverappa.
Akash Deep had impressed on debut in the recent fourth Test against England, which India won to seal the series.
In a departure from the norm, the BCCI this time has not mentioned the remuneration of the players across the four categories.
Cricketers are normally paid Rs 7 crore per annum in A plus bracket, Rs 5 crore in A, Rs 3 crore in B and Rs one crore in C category, over and above their match fees.
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SC cancels bail to wrestler Sushil Kumar in murder case, orders surrender in a week
New Delhi (PTI): The Supreme Court on Wednesday cancelled bail to Olympic medallist Sushil Kumar in the murder case of former junior national wrestling champion Sagar Dhankar at the Chhatrasal Stadium in the national capital.
A bench of justices Sanjay Karol and Prashant Kumar Mishra set aside the March 4 order of the Delhi High Court granting bail to the wrestler.
The wrestler has been asked to surrender within a week.
The top court's order came on an appeal filed by Ashok Dhankar, father of Sagar Dhankar, challenging the order passed by the Delhi High Court granting bail to Kumar.
Kumar and others are accused of fatally assaulting Sagar Dhankar in May 2021 over an alleged property dispute.
Two of Sagar Dhankar's friends were also injured in the assault.
According to the postmortem report, the victim suffered cerebral damage from the impact of a blunt object.
Kumar was arrested in May 2021 and a sessions court had granted him a week's interim bail for his knee surgery on July 19, 2023.
The trial court in October 2022 framed IPC charges, including murder, criminal conspiracy, intimidation and rioting with a deadly weapon against Kumar aside from the Arms Act, among others.
The trial court noted that after being abducted and brought to the stadium, Sagar Dhankar was severely assaulted by several accused persons with baseball and hockey sticks.
