Delhi plays spoiler in Pak cricket tour, cuts visas

MISSING FANS: Pakistani cricket fans will be missing on the stands during Indo-Pak cricket encounters this time around.

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New Delhi: The Pakistan cricket team's India tour is all set to kick off, but a move by the Indian Home Ministry is now threatening to take the shine off the most-anticipated cricket series of the year.

Citing security reasons, the MHA has decided to drastically reduce the number of visas to be given to the Pakistani fans this time around.

The move is bound to disappoint Pakistani cricket fans, who generally flock in in thousands whenever their team lock horns with India on Indian soil.

Last time when the Pakistani team came to India, 1,000 tickets were given to Pakistani supporters for every match. But this time, this number has been cut down to 250 tickets per match, both for the One-dayers as well as Test matches.

The Pakistani team, which arrives in New Delhi on Thursday evening, will play five One-Day Internationals and 3 Test matches during its 42-day tour.

The five One-dayers will be played at Guwahati, Mohali, Kanpur, Gwalior and Jaipur while Delhi, Kolkata and Bangalore will host the Test matches.

The Home Ministry claims many of the cricket fans, who come to India on these special visas, go missing once the tour is over. Indian security agencies are alarmed over the disappearance of an increasing number of Pakistani fans in the country.

The last time around, about 50 people went missing. While two of the offenders were later arrested, the whereabouts of the rest are still unknown.

The Indian authorities are, therefore, apprehensive about issuing a large number of visas this time. They say there is a danger of various terrorist outfits and the ISI using these kind of events to find a passage into the country.

Cricket fans in Pakistan have reacted angrily to the move. They have slammed the move and demanded that the quota of visas be increased.

The 16-member Pakistani team, led by Shoaib Malik, will play a warm-up game against New Delhi at the Feroz Shah Kotla ground on Friday before they leave for Guwahati for their first ODI.