The Board of Control for Cricket in India on Wednesday rubbished a media report that claimed Sachin Tendulkar spurned captaincy in protest against the Board allegedly paying more money to foreign players who are being roped in for the Indian Premier League.
A vernacular television channel claimed that Tendulkar was miffed with the BCCI, as were Rahul Dravid and Sourav Ganguly, for allegedly offering more money to foreigners to play in the league.
BCCI secretary Niranjan Shah, however, dismissed the claims, saying they are "malicious and absolutely false".
"The story is aimed at embarrassing our senior cricketers and, in fact, Sachin Tendulkar called me up to issue a clarification to the effect that he has not spoken to any journalist on the issue and his name is being tarnished," Shah said in a statement.
Shah asserted that the senior players have offered full support to the BCCI-backed Twenty20 league.
"Our president, Sharad Pawar, met the team in England and briefed them about the IPL, and later Lalit Modi also met the players and explained to them the format and it was then that the top four players were invited to the launch and all of them came and supported BCCI's initiative to start the IPL, which will benefit Indian cricketers at large," he said.
Later, speaking from Rajkot, Shah said no details about payments being offered to different players have been worked out.
"We have not even finalised the details of payments to the players. This (report) is absolutely shocking," he said.
