The Hindu : Player Terms unfair: Ganguly

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Aug 30, 2002

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National

Player Terms unfair: Ganguly

By G. Viswanath

Derby Aug. 29. The Indian cricket captain, Sourav Ganguly, has said that the Participating Nations Agreement signed by the Board of Control for Cricket in India and the `Player Terms' that the team members are asked to sign, "are unfair and made for the commercial gain of the IDI/BCCI without giving our (players) interest sufficient weightage."

In a signed statement, Ganguly said: "From the flow of events, it appears that the IDI, GCC and NewsCorp have signed an agreement relating to the media and sponsorship rights contract on July 20, 2000. Thereafter, it appears from our discussions with you that the BCCI signed a Cricket Events Agreement on May 28, 2002 (a copy of which we have not yet seen). Pursuant to that document, you recently signed a Participating Nations Agreement on June 22, 2002 and forwarded the same to the ICC while objecting to its contents and recognising that the clauses impinge on the commercial rights of the players.''

"Now we are asked to sign without any further discussion to review the Player Terms which is Schedule 3 to the PNA and which was forwarded to us only recently. Under the GCC Agreement, NewsCorp has paid significant amounts to IDI, based on its ability to commercially exploit the events in various forms and without our prior knowledge. The IDI (and now the BCCI) has committed that we, the players, will suffer several restrictions, without any consultation and without our prior agreement.

"What you have proposed is that we will now continue to suffer these restrictions, but limited only to the Champions Trophy, 2002. You have also offered to take up the matter for future ICC events on behalf of the players.

"The width and breadth of these restrictions as contained in the PNA and Player Terms are, we believe, unfair and are made for the commercial gain of IDI/BCCI without giving our interest sufficient weightage,'' he said.

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