All-rounder Shakib Al Hasan has landed himself in trouble after he signed a deal with a telecom company, violating the terms and conditions of the Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB).
According to BCB’s players’ agreement, a cricketer under national contract cannot join a telecom company as Robi Telecom is the team’s title sponsor.
“He cannot make this agreement [with a telecom company] and why he cannot make this agreement is clearly stated in our contract paper,” BCB president Nazmul Hasan told Bengali daily Kalerkantho.
“Robi [Telecom] was our title sponsor and Grameenphone did not bid and instead they grabbed few cricketers by paying them TK One or Two Crores. What happened in the end? The board lost TK 90 Crores in three years,” he said.
The 32-year-old was announced as the brand ambassador of Grameenphone, the local telecom giants on October 22, a day after the country’s cricketers led by Shakib, had announced a strike to force the BCB to accept a 11-point demand. The timing of the deal hasn’t gone down well with the board’s president.
“Some players gained but the board had to suffer. It cannot happen. So they are informed about it on paper. I think even from the ministry they are told not to do any agreement with the telecom company without informing them while it is there in our contract paper. Then how come he does this agreement without informing us. And look at the timing. It was done when there was no cricket [due to strike]. Look at the audacity,” the president fumed.
A show-cause notice is set to be issued to Shakib, who is currently the ODI and T20I captain of Bangladesh.
“We are going into legal action. We cannot spare anyone in this regard. We will ask for compensation. We will seek compensation from the company as well as from the player. I heard about it [on October 23] and asked to sent legal notice to Grameenphone to claim compensation. I asked to send a letter to Shakib for explanation. We must give him a chance to show he didn’t break the rule. To us it seemed that it was something like ‘give a damn to the board’ and if that is the case we will take tough action,” he added.
