The Indian Cricket Board (BCCI) has decided to award one-time ex-gratia payments to a number of former cricketers which include current national selector Devang Gandhi, Sarandeep Singh along with bowling coach Bharat Arun. It has been learnt that BCCI has zeroed in on 55 former India players, who have either not been paid during the first lot of payments or are due to get some balance of payments.
Most of these players have played less than 10 Test matches.
There were a lot of cricketers, who were missing from the initial list while there were a few who got Rs 30 lakh out of the sanctioned Rs 35 lakh. A list has been prepared in this regard to include all the cricketers in the ambit.
Some of the more well-known names include former India all-rounder Robin Singh, current India player Yuvraj Singh's father Yograj Singh, noted bowling coach TA Sekhar, wicketkeeper-batsman Vijay Dahiya. Ousted national selector Jatin Paranjpe also figures in this list along with former India medium pacers like Sanjeev Sharma and Salil Ankola.
Test players from the 1970's like Kenia Jayantilal, Sudhir Naik and from the 80's like Raju Kulkarni also feature in the list.
Meanwhile, former first-class players like Prakash Bhatt, Milind Pradhan, Arman Malik, Rakesh Parikh, Shankar Saini have been shortlisted for interview for the Indian cricket team's administrative manager's post.
Interestingly, Parikh has been a junior national selector and former medium pacer Saini was the Delhi team manager when the infamous bust-up between Gautam Gambhir and KP Bhaskar happened in Bhubaneswar.