Kathmandu, January 28

The meeting of Nepal Advisory Group and International Cricket Council today asked the elected committee of the Cricket Association of Nepal to amend the statute by tomorrow and help in lifting the suspension of its membership.

ICC Deputy Chairman Imran Khwaja met with the Nepal Advisory Group members and the meeting discussed about the issues related to lifting CAN membership suspension along with reaching an agreement on the statute.

“The discussion was about to try and to reach an agreement and the steps to be taken so that the ICC’s suspension of Nepal could be lifted,” Khwaja told The Himalayan Times after a five-hour meeting. “There is ICC Board Meeting and Annual Conference in June and if the board members agree on the resolution then Nepal’s suspension will be lifted. If everything goes wrong, then we cannot do that,” Khwaja added.

Khwaja said that the main agenda of the meeting was to reach an agreement on the statute. “The most important thing was to try and agree to the statute that would be agreeable to all the stakeholders of Nepal. And we have come to some sort of principal agreement and we will have the draft shortly. We are optimistic that we can arrive to a conclusion to this,” added Khwaja. “The of fate Nepali cricket is in the hands of Advisory Committee. If everything goes well through the committee, I am optimistic about lifting the suspension,” added Khwaja.

Meanwhile, a reliable source, said that the issues related to statute amendment were discussed and there were agreements on some issues. “The meeting agreed that all the 17 members of the elected committee will not contest in the election, while a five-member Monitory Group will be formed to monitor the general assembly of the CAN,” the source said. “The group will have three representatives from ICC and one each from elected CAN and NSC.”

“Earlier, it was mentioned that the committee will be formed of seven members including representatives from Ministry of Youth and Sports. But the ICC objected on that saying that would be government’s interference and we all agreed on five-member body,” the source said. “And we also agreed to hold re-elections of the district committees.” Similarly, the meeting agreed that national cricketer, who has not represented national team for the last two years, will also be allowed to contest in the election.

Elected committee President Chatur Bahadur Chand and General Secretary Ashok Nath Pyakurel are the members of the Nepal Advisory Group, which was formed by the ICC to end the crisis of Nepali cricket after CAN membership was suspended in April 2016. The ICC had imposed the ban after National Sports Council did not approve the CAN elections and formed an ad hoc committee.

Binod Chaudhary and Binay Raj Pandey are the co-convenors of the committee, while former CAN acting president Deepak Koirala, former national team skipper Pawan Agrawal, NSC Press Advisor Rohit Dahal are the other officials.