LAHORE: The International Cricket Council (ICC) on Wednesday ordered the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to pay 60 percent of the costs incurred by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and an ICC panel during the two boards’ legal wrangle over a bilateral series agreement. The ICC, whose Dispute Resolution Committee (DRC) had last month ruled in the BCCI’s favour and dismissed the $70 million compensation claim against it, yesterday delivered another blow to the PCB. The global cricket governing body, in a press release, announced that its DRC panel “has determined that the PCB should pay 60 percent of the BCCI’s claimed costs as well as the administrative costs and expenses of the Panel” itself. Furthermore, the ICC said that its judgement on the matter is “binding and non-appealable.” The PCB had filed the compensation case against India during former chairman Najam Sethi’s era. The PCB officials were hopeful for a decision in their favour in the compensation case but the verdict announced on November 20 went against them. The latest judgement did not specify the exact amount that was claimed by the Indian Board but it is likely to be nearly $2 million. The PCB had demanded 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 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. Published in Daily Times, December 20th2018.