||Desk Report||

Pakistan urged the higher authority of cricket ICC to ban the Indian team for ‘politicising the game’ as the Indian cricket team to donned army camouflage caps during fourth ODI against Australia held in Ranchi on March 8, reports Dawn. However, Indian claimed it as [a] mark of tribute to the loss of lives in Pulwama terror attack and the armed forces.

The report claimed that the Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said to the reporters on Saturday that ICC should take a suo motu notice of the matter. "The world saw that the Indian cricket team wore military caps instead of their own, did ICC not see this?" asked the Pakistani Foreign Minister.

"We think that it is the ICC's responsibility to take notice of this without the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) bringing it up," the Minister added during a discussion about the prevailing India-Pakistan situation at Jatoi House in Sukkur.

However, Aljazeera reported on Saturday that the idea to sport the army caps bearing the BCCI's logo came from former Indian cricket captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni, who is an honorary lieutenant colonel with the Indian army.

Indian captain Virat Kohli said before the game that this is ‘to pay respect to the martyrs’. "It's a special cap, This is to pay respect to the martyrs ... and their families," said India Captain.

Earlier, Times of India reported on March 7 that the Committee of Administrators (CoA) chairman Vinod Rai claimed BCCI is still seeking an ICC ban on countries that harbour terrorism despite a recent rejection but was non-committal on whether India will boycott Pakistan at the World Cup.

At the ICC board meeting in Dubai last week, ICC dismissed BCCI's request to sever ties with countries from where terrorism emanates, though the Indian Board did not make a specific reference to Pakistan. Rai insisted that the ICC has not shot down BCCI's request of banning Pakistan from international cricket. The CoA likely to discuss with ICC chairman Shashank Manohar on the India-Pakistan issue in Mumbai later this month.