After filing his nomination for the BCCI presidential post earlier this month, former India skipper Sourav Ganguly had categorically mentioned that providing financial security to first-class cricketers will be among his main priorities.
And now that Ganguly has secured the top position unopposed, he stayed true to his words. On Tuesday (October 29), the new BCCI president hinted that a contract system will soon be in place for the thousands of first-class cricketers in India.
In a move that could transform the lives of domestic cricketers, Ganguly wants to introduce a secured structured payment system akin to the annual central contract for country's top international players.
"We will bring in a contract system for first-class cricketers. We (office-bearers) will ask the new finance (sub) committee to prepare a contract system," the BCCI chief told PTI during an exclusive interaction.
"It's just been four-five days and in between there was a Diwali break. It will take about two weeks to assess everything and move forward. There is a lot of work going on," he added.
At present, a domestic cricketer annually earns around Rs 25 to 30 lakh depending on the matches played. The fee for a first-class fixture is Rs 35,000 per day (excluding the daily allowance) and the domestic cricketers get 13 percent distributed amongst them from the gross revenue earned by BCCI through broadcast rights.
Since every state cricket association has different working mechanism, working out modalities for contract system will be complex.
Whether the BCCI draws a broad outline for gradation of the players or tells the state units to do the same, one thing is certain that Ganguly is keen on improving India’s domestic circuit.
(With PTI inputs)
