In what came as a shocking revelation, it now transpires that the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) still owes the India Women’s cricket team the prize money they earned for reaching the final of the ICC T20 World Cup 2020. The shocking revelation came in a report in The Telegraph, by Isabelle Westbury.
Among other things, the screeching halt induced by the Covid-19 has laid bare the disparity of women’s cricket. More than a year has passed since the final, on 8 March, but the BCCI is yet to distribute USD 500,000 among the participants.
As per norms, the International Cricket Council (ICC) disburse the prize money at most within a week since the completion of the tournament. However, a senior BCCI official, on the condition of anonymity, claimed there had been a delay from the ICC. He further added that the BCCI had been unable to process the payment due to the shutdown of their headquarters in Mumbai.
However, this sounds far from a convincing explanation, especially since the Australian cricketers were paid their amount by April 2020, and the English team, who did not even make it to the final, by May 2020.
Despite Covid-19 wreaking havoc across the nations, the BCCI successfully conducted the IPL 2020 in the UAE; India Men toured Australia and hosted England; and the 2021 edition of the IPL went underway before the pandemic situation went out of hand.
In the same period of time, Indian Women have played just five ODIs and three T20Is, that too after a 364-day gap after the T20 World Cup final.
The same BCCI source also told the PTI that the transaction has been processed, and the cricketers will get their due amount by the end of this week: ‘The members of the Indian women's cricket team will be getting the share of their prize money by the end of this week. The transactions have been processed and I am expecting that they will receive their share very soon.’
Earlier this week, the wage disparity came to the fore after the BCCI announced the central contract for India Women. Even those in Grade A (INR 50 lakhs) are paid half the Men in Grade C (INR 1 crore).
A day after that, BCCI secretary Jay Shah took to Twitter to announce a one-off Test for India in the upcoming tour to Australia. If anything, the tweet was nothing more than a strategic step to mitigate the furore that arose after the wage inequality was highlighted by the Women’s contracts.
India Women’s next assignment will be against England, starting with a Test match in Bristol next month. Following that they will be playing three ODIs and as many T20Is. They will be departing for the UK on 2 June.