-Ashwani Kumar Chrungoo
India yet again won the Cricket Asia Cup 2025 championship in Dubai on 28th September 2025. It was a Sunday and as usual Pakistan got defeated in the final match losing to Team India consecutively for the third Sunday in a row. In order to add further embarrassment to the humiliation of consistent defeats, Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) Chairman, Mohsin Naqvi, who is also the Chairman of the Asian Cricket Council (ACC) and the Interior Minister of Pakistan in an unprecedented bizarre act went away with the Trophy of the tournament along with the medals meant for the members of the Team India after the grand finale. Team India had refused to accept the Trophy and the medals from Mohsin Naqvi due to his recent controversial statements & overtures against India and Team India. He also remarked later that he was standing for more than an hour on the podium, and was made to look ‘like a cartoon’.
In order to discuss the above subject, it would be important to first delve upon the issue of India’s current position in the international cricketing scenario. India is a champion team in many ways. For the last two decades, Team India has been persistently improving its overall strength, talent and record in all formats of the game. At this point of time, India is recognised globally as the biggest power-house of the game of cricket. While BCCI, the governing body of the game in India, has assumed the stature of the most competent organisation in terms of infrastructure, it has also developed a big pool of players in the country, unassuming riches and also the strength of organising domestic, international and IPL tournaments throughout the year. In the Asian context, India is undoubtedly the number one team in all formats of the game.
Team India during these two decades enhanced its international standings enormously. By virtue of its talent, it has been showing a great result in all the formats of the game. Successful domestic cricket and the IPL seasons from 2007-08 onwards have provided an added advantage to Team India at the international stage. India has been the world champions in ODI cricket two times while it narrowly missed victory two times in the finals. In T20 world championships, it has greatly excelled and has been the champion two times with effect from the year 2007. In the test format, India is a great performer and has also played two finals in the WTC formats. In the rankings, India is at number 1 in the T20 cricket in the world, number 1 in the ODI format and number 4 in the test format, which by every means is a big achievement.
India has been exceptionally consistent in all the three formats of the game especially over the last five years. In all the four departments of the game (management, batting, bowling and fielding) it has made an indelible mark and broken and created records. BCCI has been the biggest source and agency of income for the International Cricket Council (ICC) and indirectly so also for all the other national boards of the game globally. Every nation is benefitted by India and the BCCI; and this has given a great respectability and acceptability to India and the BCCI at an international level.
Pakistan doesn’t reconcile to this position of India and has been in a deniable & delusion mode historically. Cricketing relations between India and Pakistan began in 1952, five years after the partition of the country, and were always heavily influenced by politics, relations between the two governments and the general atmosphere prevailing between the two nations. The relations that started in 1952 came to a long halt in 1965 consequent upon the war between India and Pakistan. These relations were resumed after 13 years in 1978 when Morarji Desai, Indian Prime Minister and Zia Ul Haq, the President of Pakistan took political initiatives to this effect. Hard battles on the playing grounds between the teams of the two nations followed the bonhomie at the political level with bilateral series tours among the two rival neighbours.
Things worsened after the deadly terrorist attack by Pakistan in Mumbai on 26 November, 2008. It cast its shadow on the relations between the two countries and thus cricket was also a part of it. Since cricket has assumed a larger than life role in the lives of the people in South Asia, it has its repercussions as well. Keeping in view the sentiments of the people in India in the context of 26/11, the government of India and the BCCI went very slow in regard to the bilateral ties between the two nations. India adopted the doctrine of ‘terror and talks won’t go together’ and the government of the day executed the doctrine in letter and spirit right from 2014. The last bilateral series was played in the year 2011-12. However, India played against Pakistan in the multinational tournaments due to its international commitments and role without making any visit to Pakistan.
The involvement of Pakistan in the Pahalgam terror carnage on 22 April, 2025 worsened the scenario further and there was a great outrage against Pakistan throughout the length and breadth of the country. The government of India decided against any visit by Pakistan to India even in the international tournaments. Therefore, third party venues, other than the two nations were favoured for any such regional or international tournaments. This time the Asia Cup, as per schedule, was organised in UAE in the month of September 2025 by the ACC. India was the defending champion of the tournament having won the championship in 2023 in Sri Lanka. Pakistan has a very bad record against India in the international tournaments which it desires to change but hasn’t been able to do that for a long time now.
Pakistan in the recent past lost all its matches against India in all international tournaments including the Asia Cup 2023, Asian Games 2022, ODI World Cup 2023, T20 World Cup 2024, Champions Trophy 2025; and now in the Asia Cup 2025. All these tournaments barring one were won by India hands down. The frustration of the people of Pakistan in this context is understandable and it gets multiplied by the role being played by the past players of Pakistan on mainstream media, the social media and the statements unleashed by the Pak-politicians and the government of Pakistan. It becomes very difficult for the Chairman of ACC, who is incidentally also the President of PCB, to remain neutral in the prevailing circumstances. The frustration is further accumulated due to the consistent poor performance of the Pakistan players on the ground and particularly against India.
Statements, overtures and the body language of the ACC Chairman, Mohsin Naqvi forced the Indian players to refuse taking the Champions Trophy from his hands. Instead of asking anyone else to hand over the Trophy to the Champions, Mohsin Naqvi went away with the Trophy and the medals and brought disrespect to his position and his nation. This humiliation of Pakistan has been recorded live by the media internationally. Mohammad Suhai, a media influencer from Karachi, Pakistan wrote the following in his blog after the finals of the Asia Cup in Dubai:
“If we speak based on facts, India truly deserved to win this tournament. They played outstanding cricket throughout, consistently dominating their opponents. The Pakistan cricket team is not losing because of the players, it’s losing because of the people running it. The management has no vision, no planning, and no system. Every tournament we go in with hope, and every time we come out with excuses. This is not bad luck, this is bad management.
India wins because they have a proper structure: strong domestic cricket, investment at the grassroots, and long-term planning. Pakistan has none of that. We keep changing captains, coaches, and squads, but we never fix the real problem, the broken system. Our board is busy with politics, favoritism, and personal battles instead of building cricket from the ground up.
With this setup, beating India or winning major tournaments is a dream. Sometimes we may win a match by luck, but we cannot compete with consistency. From 2018 to 2025, India won five major tournaments because they planned for success. We, on the other hand, are stuck with a third-class system and people who refuse to take responsibility.
If Pakistan cricket wants respect again, the management must wake up, throw out the politics, and rebuild the system properly. Until then, we will keep losing not because of lack of talent, but because of lack of brains in management”.
Pakistan and Mohsin Naqvi believe that trophies, medals and ceremonies make champions regardless of performance. In this context, people like them need to be reminded about a Sanskrit couplet from the scriptures which is as follows:
“Na abhisheko na sanskarah, singhsya kriyatey vaney;
Vikramarjit satvasya, swyemyev mringendrata..!”
It means that in the forest, nothing like the coronation ritual or ceremony of the lion is performed. It is due to his prowess and performance that the lion naturally and automatically earns the Kingship.
Accordingly, the ACC chairman and the PCB can keep the trophy and the medals while the BCCI and India will retain the Championship and the dignity of their consistent performance with due and deserved pride.
(The author is a senior BJP & KP leader, Human Rights Defender, author & columnist and can be reached at ashwanikc2012@gmail.com)
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