Herschelle Gibbs, a South African cricketer, blasted the Board of Cricket Control in India (BCCI) on Saturday for intimidating players and preventing them from participating in the Kashmir Premier League (KPL). “Completely needless for the @BCCI to bring their political agenda with Pakistan into the mix and try to prohibit me from participating in the @kpl 20,” Gibbs said on Twitter, criticising the Indian board’s stance. “They also threatened me with not allowing me to enter India for any cricket-related job. It’s absurd, “After it was revealed that the BCCI had threatened international players through their agents, warning that if they travelled to Kashmir, the doors of Indian cricket, including the IPL, would be closed to them, he took to Twitter. Following the threat from the Indian cricket board, all foreign cricketers withdrew from the event which is set to begin on August 6. The six foreign cricketers, who have excused themselves from the KPL, are Herschelle Gibbs, Matt Prior, Phil Mustard, Owais Shah, Tenu Best and Monty Panesar. Sources said that the BCCI officials contacted the English and African cricket boards and threatened to ban their players from entering India if they participated in the KPL. The English and African boards stopped their players from taking part in the KPL until further orders. Taking stock of the new situation and considering the security of the foreign players, the KPL management apologised to the remaining foreign players. However, KPL President Arif Malik has said that the tournament will go ahead as scheduled, adding that Pakistani cricketers will participate.