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Will India travel to Pakistan to play cricket? This is the big question which has become the talking point among everyone ever since Pakistan were given the rights to host the 2023 Asia Cup and 2025 Champions Trophy. While BCCI can exercise their power to not travel to their neighbouring nation for bilateral series, it will be intriguing to see what happens when the two multi-nation tournaments actually take place.
Recently, India's sports minister Anurag Thakur had admitted that the decision regarding the cricket team travelling to Pakistan will be taken with how the situations are at that particular point of time. “When the time will come, the Indian government and the Home Ministry will take a decision. During the international championships, all the factors are looked upon," he said.
Ramiz Raja confident that India will travel to Pakistan for mega events
Since then, there have been speculations that the two tournaments (2023 Asia Cup and 2025 Champions Trophy) might be moved from Pakistan if India decides to pull out of the event. However, PCB chairman Ramiz Raja is very confident that it won't happen.
In a recent interaction with media, the 59-year-old even went on to slam the reporter who claimed that the 2023 Asia Cup might move to UAE because of India's reluctance to travel to Pakistan. Raja said, "Nahi sir, UAE nahi ja rahe hai (for Asia Cup 2023)... aap itna negative kyu ho rahe hai? Bharat ki vajah se har cheez nahi hoti hai, kuch hum bhi hai, don't worry." (No sir, we are not going to UAE (for Asia Cup 2023)... why are you being so negative? Not everything will happen according to India, we are also someone, don't worry.
Reflecting on the fact that India might pull out of the tournaments hosted by Pakistan, the PCB chairman said, "Ye jo international tournaments hote hai, usme pull out karna itna asaan nahi hota... ye cheeze (tournaments) jab di jaati hai mulko ko toh ye saari cheeze saamne rakh ke di jaati hai aur main ye samajhta hu ki aisa nahi hoga." (It is not an easy task to pull out of an international tournament. Once the rights are awarded, these feuds between different cricketing boards are also considered while making the decision. In my opinion, India will not pull out).
While admitting that bilateral series between India and Pakistan might not happen in near future, Raja aadded that there are chances that the two teams can be seen playing in tri-nation tournaments in the coming time.