Last Updated on 38 minutes ago by Charbel Coorey
BCCI secretary Devajit Saikia has backed the Indian women’s team’s decision to not accept the Women’s Asia Cup trophy from Mohsin Naqvi, who is the Pakistan Cricket Board chairman and Asian Cricket Council president.
India won the tournament, beating Sri Lanka by 72 runs in Sunday’s final. But the trophy presentation was not held as scheduled as the Indian team said they would rather receive the trophy from ACC vice president Khalid Al Zarooni rather than Naqvi.
The move comes against the backdrop of ongoing India-Pakistan tension. Relations between the two countries soured further after the terror attack in Pahalgam in April 2025 and India’s launch of Operation Sindoor thereafter.
Despite the political situation, India and Pakistan have continued to meet in multinational cricket tournaments. However, the traditional post-match handshake between the two sides has failed to materialise in recent games. It was the same in the men’s section last year when the Indian team also refused to take the trophy from Naqvi during Asia Cup.
Devajit Saikia: “Our Women’s team expresses solidarity and did not accept the trophy in a similar situation.”
Speaking to IANS after the Women’s Asia Cup finale, the BCCI secretary spoken about how their relationship with arch rivals has changed and supported team India’s stance of not accepting the trophy from Naqvi.
“Our men’s team won the Asia Cup a year and a half [a year] ago. And our whole situation since the Pahalgam incident in April 2025 changed after that. So after that there was pressure on us from our citizens that we shouldn’t keep any relations with our neighboring country and not play cricket with them,” Saikia said.
“But our government has a policy that we must play against every country in multinational tournaments. So we are following that policy and abiding by that, the BCCI sends a squad to play every team.
“But that doesn’t mean we will play and follow every condition laid out for us. The country with which our relations were already bad and which have deteriorated considerably since April 2025 – our operation is still ongoing. One of their key leaders [Naqvi] is working against the interests of our country – we cannot receive the trophy from him.
“A year ago, we did not accept the trophy in the Men’s Asia Cup. Our women’s team has also taken a decision today to express solidarity with that decision and did not accept the trophy in a similar situation,” he said.
Saikia also congratulated the Indian women’s team for their successful campaign in the Asia Cup where they remained unbeaten through the tournament. With that contest out of the way, the focus now shifts to the upcoming Asian Games in Aichi Nagoya.
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