Several Opposition parties on Sunday criticised the Union government over the India-Pakistan Asia Cup match, calling it an insult to the memory of the 26 people killed in the Pahalgam terrorist attack.
The rivals are facing off for the first time since the April 22 attack and the subsequent conflict following India’s Operation Sindoor.
AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi asked the government if the money earned through the match was more than the value of the lives of those killed in Pahalgam. “How much money will the BCCI get from one cricket match? `2,000 crore, `3,000 crore? Tell us is the value of the lives of our 26 citizens more or the money? The BJP should tell us about it,” he said in Hyderabad.
Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray termed the match an insult to national sentiments. Sena (UBT) MP Sanjay Raut said the game had exposed the “bankruptcy of Narendra Modi and Amit Shah’s nationalism” and claimed that betting worth `1.5 lakh crore was linked to the match. “In Pahalgam, the vermilion was wiped off the foreheads of 26 women. Prime Minister Narendra Modi staged a chest-thumping drama. India has pulled out of international matches before. Why not now? Because Jay Shah has an interest. Modi has no morality left. The BJP can stop a war under Trump’s pressure, but not a cricket match with Pakistan,” Raut said.
Jay Shah, son of Union Home Minister Amit Shah, heads the International Cricket Council.
Across Maharashtra, Sena (UBT) workers demonstrated under the banner “majhe kunku, maza desh” (my vermilion, my country). Party workers broke television sets and women members collected sindoor, saying it would be sent to Modi.
In the national capital, the AAP took out similar protests led by its Delhi unit chief Saurabh Bharadwaj. Bharadwaj said that while the PM once claimed “hot sindoor ran through his veins” after the Pahalgam terror attack, that fire had gone cold. The protest saw party workers smashing television sets outside the AAP headquarters, after which a large police presence was deployed.
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Bharadwaj, too, claimed that billions of rupees in international betting were driving the need to hold this match.
Though he was not present at the protest, AAP chief and former Delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal posted on X: “Playing a match with Pakistan is treason against the country and every Indian is deeply angry about it.”
TMC leader and Krishnanagar MP Mahua Moitra took a jab at Modi and Amit Shah, posting on X: “Blood & water can’t flow together to Pakistan. But clearly blood & cricket can. Especially when @AmitShah’s “merit-only” son’s fortunes depend on it. May the best team win.”
The TMC leader was referring to PM Modi’s remark that “blood and water won’t flow together” with regard to the suspension of the Indus Waters Treaty.
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Asked about the match, RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav said: “This is a question that should be posed to Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who had famously bragged about vermilion (sindoor) flowing in his veins.” “Pakistan is a partner of the BJP, which likes to start a military conflict and put off a water treaty, only to announce a ceasefire later. Now, it has agreed to a cricket match, all as per its own convenience,” he said.
