Virat Kohli Unhappy With BCCI's Pay Hike, Demands More

India captain Virat Kohli is not pleased with the Board of Control for Cricket in India's (BCCI) pay hike and wants Indian cricketers to earn more than what they are getting at the moment. It is learnt that Kohli seems to be unhappy with the current structure of payment after getting to know that his foreign counterparts earn more than what the India players make for a living. This comes a day after former India captain Ravi Shastri said categorically that the India players were being paid 'peanuts', compared to their foreign colleagues.

The BCCI had last month doubled the retainers for all contracted players to Rs.2 crore, Rs.1 crore and Rs.50 lakh respectively for the three graded categories A, B and C. The board also enhanced the match fees to Rs.15 lakh, Rs.6 lakh and Rs.3 lakh per Test match, One-Day International (ODI) and Twenty20 International respectively.

Not satisfied with these revised pay structure, Shastri said, "It's (what they are getting) nothing, (Rs) 2 crore is peanuts. How much is an Australian (cricketer) getting?"

Earlier, the Indian team support staff was not happy with the salary hike offered to them by the BCCI and it was believed that they had turned down the offer.

The staff, which includes batting coach Sanjay Bangar and fielding coach R Sridhar, was promised a 100 percent hike during the Anurag Thakur regime, but later they were offered only 25 percent increment on their current salaries.

The Indian cricketers stand fourth in the list of most paid cricketers around the world, behind - England, Australia and South Africa which just goes on to vindicate Kohli's point.

"Kohli - supported by coach Anil Kumble - argued that while cricketers in England, Australia and South Africa could pick up a purse worth Rs.10-12 crores (inclusive of retainer fee and match fee), a top Indian cricketer would earn a maximum of Rs.4-5 crores (inclusive of retainer fee and match fee). The Indian skipper made it clear it was grossly unacceptable, at a time when the BCCI earned the maximum and was lobbying for a lion's share from revenues of International Cricket Council (ICC)," a BCCI source was quoted as saying by FirstPost.

According to the report, Kohli is said to have demanded a different set of contracts for different formats with an increase in pay for the Grade A retainer to Rs.5 crore, Grade B to Rs.3 crore and Grade C to Rs.1.5 crore.

With players like Cheteshwar Pujara only playing Test cricket, and without an IPL contract, they miss out on a large chunk of money whereas players who play only the IPL or all the three formats earn a lot more than the ones only playing one format of the game.