ICC orders PCB to pay 60 per cent of cost claimed by BCCI in compensation tussle

Dubai: The ICC's Dispute Resolution Panel Wednesday ordered Pakistan to pay 60 per cent of the cost demanded by the BCCI after the world body's rejection of the PCB's compensation claim which blamed India for lack of bilateral series between the two nations.

Nearly a month after rejecting the Pakistan Cricket Board's (PCB) compensation claim against India for allegedly failing to honour a Memorandum of Understanding on bilateral cricket, the ICC announced the costs award for the two Boards.

"...the Panel orders the PCB to pay the BCCI sixty percent (60%) of: (a) the Claimed Costs; and (b) the administrative costs and expenses of the Panel...," the ICC committee said in its fresh judgement, which is binding.

The BCCI, on the other hand, has been asked to pay 40 per cent of the administrative costs and expenses of the DRC. The judgement did not specify the exact amount that was claimed by the Indian Board.

The PCB had demanded Rs 447 crore compensation after alleging that the BCCI didn't honour the MoU that required India to play six bilateral series between 2015 and 2023.

The BCCI, on its part, maintained that the alleged MoU was not binding and did not stand as Pakistan failed to honour a commitment to support the revenue model suggested by India for the ICC.

The ICC then constituted a three-member Dispute Resolution Committee (DRC) to look into the PCB's compensation claim. The hearing took place at the world body's headquarters here from October 1-3.

"For the BCCI, the victor in the arbitration, to be deprived of all its costs would appear to the Panel to be inappropriate, where the BCCI too had disputed the claim in good faith," the ICC panel stated.

The BCCI had demanded that the PCB "pay the full amount" of its legal costs and the costs of arbitral proceedings including any administrative fees of the ICC, and the fees of the panel, among other expenses.

The PCB, on its part, argued that BCCI's claims are no more than "incomplete summaries". However, the panel rejected the PCB's assertion that there should be no order on costs at all.

The panel observed that since it had rejected the PCB's claims for compensation, costs award had to be decided as well.

"However, for the BCCI to be granted all of its costs would also be inappropriate...," the panel noted and cited the letter that the Board had given the PCB which spoke of bilateral cricket between the two countries and which was the basis of Pakistan's claim.

The ICC committee felt that the BCCI could have made it clear to the PCB at the very outset that the letter was merely a declaration of intent and not the MoU that Pakistan perceived it to be.

"Such misapprehension - indeed these proceedings - would have been avoided if the BCCI, who proposed the letter, had - as it could so easily have done - made clear that it was only a declaration of intent," the DRC stated.