North East State Cricket Association of India are planning to request BCCI for an entry in India’s biggest domestic tournament Ranji Trophy as a combined team.
Committee of Administrators (CoA) had already made a recommendation to give full status to the six North Indian states Meghalaya, Manipur, Mizoram, Arunachal Pradesh, Nagaland, and Sikkim. Now the six states are set to request the board to allow them to play as a combined team in the upcoming edition of Ranji Trophy.
Naba Bhattacharya, convenor of the association, has suggested that all the representatives from the six states will be meeting with CoA on September 8 to discuss the issue, after being once again ignored for the Ranji season.
Two North East states Tripura and Assam are seasonal teams in the coveted tournament, but the other states are keen to form as a single team to enter into Ranji season. But Bhattacharya said that they were surprised after being ignored once again.
“We were really surprised to find that BCCI has chalked up the Ranji schedule and North Eastern states have once again been ignored despite Lodha Committee’s ‘one-state one-vote’ diktat. We are not saying that we want to play as individual states. But there should be a start somewhere,” Bhattacharya told PTI today.
“The North East cricket association representatives will be meeting the COA, and we will propose that a combined team be fielded this year. We have good enough players in each State to have a pool of 20 players from which we can select the north east team. Also in the Vijay Merchant Trophy (U-16) and Cooch Behar Trophy (U-19), we have been playing as a combined team. We want to now play as individual States,” he added.
“There is still a month left. If they can have 28 teams, why can’t they include us and Bihar and make it a 30-team affair and make changes accordingly,” Bhattacharya said.