Pakistan boycotts India match in solidarity with Bangladesh: Shehbaz Sharif

Pakistan has decided to boycott its match against India in protest against Bangladesh’s exclusion from the ICC T20 World Cup, the country’s prime minister Shehbaz Sharif said.

Addressing members of his cabinet on Wednesday, the prime minister said, “We’ve taken a very clear stand on the T20 World Cup. We will not play against India, because there should be no politics in sports. This decision has been taken after careful consideration. We should stand fully with Bangladesh. I believe this is a very appropriate decision.”

Pakistan announced its decision not to play against India after the International Cricket Council (ICC) excluded Bangladesh from the T20 World Cup without taking into account Dhaka’s security concerns.

Although the decision of PCB was made public last week, this was the first time the Pakistani government formally explained the reasons behind it.

Earlier, the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman had questioned what he described as the ICC’s double standards.

The 2026 ICC T20 World Cup, jointly hosted by India and Sri Lanka, is scheduled to begin on 7 February. The India–Pakistan match was set to take place in Colombo on 15 February.

However, in a post on Sunday, the Pakistani government’s official X account announced that the Pakistan team would not play against India. The PCB has not made any public comment on the matter.

On the same day, however, the ICC issued a statement urging Pakistan to “reconsider” its decision, warning of its “long-term implications”.

Bangladesh had decided not to send its team to India for the T20 World Cup after cricketer Mustafizur Rahman was dropped from the Indian Premier League (IPL) following threats from extremist groups in India.

On 4 January, Bangladesh requested the ICC to move its World Cup matches to Sri Lanka. The ICC rejected the request, describing the Mustafizur incident as “isolated and irrelevant”.

Bangladesh’s interim government’s sports adviser Asif Nazrul later said that the ICC had failed to take the security of Bangladeshi players into account, while the Indian government had not provided any assurances on the issue.

When Bangladesh remained firm in its decision not to send the team to India, the ICC ultimately excluded Bangladesh from the tournament and included Scotland instead.

Questioning why security concerns were considered in the cases of India and Pakistan but not Bangladesh, PCB chairman Mohsin Naqvi criticised what he called the ICC’s double standards.

He also said that Bangladesh was being treated unfairly. Earlier, Naqvi had voted in favour of Bangladesh during the ICC board meeting on whether to change the tournament venue.