Pujara, Rahane, Hardik Pandya get demoted in BCCI central contracts
Mohali, Mar 2: Out of favour veteran batter Cheteshwar Pujara and former Test vice-captain Ajinkya Rahane were downgraded in the latest central contracts list of the BCCI that was ratified by the Board's Apex Council on Wednesday.
The BCCI has four categories -- A+ which has annual remuneration of Rs 7 crore while A, B and C categories are valued at Rs 5 crore, Rs 3 crore and Rs 1 crore respectively.
Last time, 28 cricketers were provided central contracts but this year, 27 have been awarded contracts with Rohit Sharma, Virat Kohli and Jasprit Bumrah static as A+ players.
Accordingly, Pujara, Rahane and Ishant Sharma, who were in Grade A are now in Grade B, after a slump in form that saw them being dropped from the upcoming home Test series against Sri Lanka.
That they will be downgraded was reported by PTI on January 20.
Group A, which earlier had 10 players, has now shrunk to five with Ravichandran Ashwin, Ravindra Jadeja, Rishabh Pant, KL Rahul and Mohammed Shami retaining their slots.
The biggest demotion, however, was for injury-ravaged all-rounder Hardik Pandya, who has been shunted out from Grade A to C in the list along with senior opener Shikhar Dhawan, who now plays only one format and that is ODIs.
Controversial keeper-batter Wriddhiman Saha, who has been dropped from the Test team, will still be richer by Rs 1 crore after being demoted from group B to C.
Saha, who has breached the central contract clause by public comments on selection matters and statements on BCCI president Sourav Ganguly and head coach Rahul Dravid, has been kept in group C even though it has been made clear by the team management that he is unlikely to play for India again.
On the day, ratification happened but this was decided long back that some of the non-performers will be demoted.
Spinner Kuldeep Yadav and pacer Navdeep Saini, who were part of the earlier group, have been dropped from the list altogether.
Mayank Agarwal, who has been inconsistent throughout, has now been demoted to group C from group B.
The ones who have been rewarded are Mohammed Siraj, who is now in group B for his lion-hearted performances while Suryakumar Yadav, by virtue of playing the requisite number of games, is now in group C.
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Will Modi govt conduct Kargil Review Committee-type exercise on Pahalgam, asks Congress
New Delhi (PTI): The Congress on Tuesday said its repeated demands for a Prime Minister Narendra Modi-chaired all-party meeting and a special session of Parliament assume even greater urgency and importance in light of the statements from Washington DC.
The opposition party also asked whether the Modi government will conduct an exercise similar to the Vajpayee government that set up the Kargil Review Committee on July 29, 1999, three days after the Kargil War ended.
"Three days after the Kargil War ended, the Vajpayee Government set up the Kargil Review Committee on July 29 1999. Its report was tabled in Parliament on February 23, 2000 although sections of it have remained classified - as indeed they must," Congress general secretary in-charge Jairam Ramesh said in a post on X.
The Committee was chaired by India's strategic affairs guru K. Subrahmanyam, whose son is now India's External Affairs Minister, he said.
"Will the Modi Govt now conduct a similar exercise on Pahalgam, notwithstanding the NIA probe?" Ramesh said.
"Given the statements from Washington DC, the INC's repeated demands for an all-party meeting TO BE CHAIRED BY THE PM himself and for a special session of Parliament - which is now scheduled to meet at least two and a half months from now - assume even greater urgency and importance," he said on X.
Ramesh's remarks come a day after President Donald Trump reiterated his claim that his administration stopped a "nuclear conflict" between India and Pakistan, telling the South Asian neighbours that America will do a "lot of trade" with them if they end hostilities.
"On Saturday, my administration helped broker a full and immediate ceasefire, I think, a permanent one between India and Pakistan, ending a dangerous conflict of two nations with lots of nuclear weapons," Trump said at the start of a press conference in the White House where he announced that he will set 30-day deadline for drugmakers to lower cost of prescription drugs.
He started the briefing by describing the historic events that took place over the last few days in the Indian subcontinent.
India and Pakistan reached an understanding on Saturday to end the conflict after four days of intense cross-border drone and missile strikes.
Indian government sources in New Delhi have been maintaining that the Director Generals of Military Operations (DGMOs) of India and Pakistan reached an understanding to stop all firings and military actions on land, air and sea, with immediate effect. They said no third party was involved.
Trump said that India and Pakistan were going at it hot and heavy, and it was seemingly not going to stop.
"I'm very proud to let you know that the leadership of India and Pakistan was unwavering, powerful, but unwavering in both cases, having these they really were from the standpoint of having the strength and the wisdom and fortitude to fully know and to understand the gravity of the situation," Trump has said.
The US President said he told India and Pakistan that America will do "a lot of trade" with them if they stop the conflict.
"And we helped a lot, and we helped also with trade. I said, 'Come on, we're going to do a lot of trade with you guys. Let's stop it. Let's stop it. If you stop it, we're doing trade. If you don't stop it, we're not going to do any trade'".
"People have never really used trade the way I used it, that I can tell you. And all of a sudden they (India and Pakistan) said, I think we're going to stop," Trump added.
"And they have, and they did it for a lot of reasons, but trade is a big one. We're going to do a lot of trade with Pakistan. We're going to do a lot of trade with India. We're negotiating with India right now. We're going to be soon negotiating with Pakistan, and we stopped a nuclear conflict," Trump said.
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