Should There be a Pay Gap Between Indian Male and Female Cricket Team?

The popularity of cricket as a sport in India is immense. It has a large viewer base throughout the country, the maximum that any sport does enjoy. The other popular sport that Indians do enjoy is football, which has gained the interest of people through tournaments like the Indian Super League. Cricket and football are two sports in whichever teenager plays in streets, fields, clubs and schools every day. 

 

 

The day before Women’s Day, BCCI made a shocking reveal with enraged people highly for the disparity which is prevalent in the pay gap between the Indian male and female cricketers. It was seen that the men’s team had four gradations while deciding the pay – 

A+ = 7 Cr

A = 5 Cr

B = 3Cr

C = 1 Cr

On the other hand, the female team has only 3-grade scales with the pay as follows – 

A = 50 lakhs

B = 30 lakhs

C = 10 lakhs

 

 

Now, the reason for this inexplicable difference could be given a reason (for argument’s sake) by thinking of the economic factors. The men’s cricket team attracts bigger crowds and has a large viewership, for this reason, they also attract big sponsorships and easier branding deals.

This leads to higher revenue being generated from the game, for which it is easier to pay the male players. Women’s cricket has not gained not that much of a popularity as of yet is what the argument says.

 

 

Some people even stretch so far to say that female sports are not interesting. That is an excessive amount of illogical crap. 

 

We’ve all engagingly watched PV Sindhu, Sania Mirza, Maria Sharapova, Serena Williams and so on while they play. We’ve even followed the games of the women’s cricket World Cup to such an extent that it attracted 19.53 million impressions. So, it is not about the game or the gender but about the fact of how well the tournaments are marketed. 

Most of us were never as interested to watch U-17 football until it was hosted by our country and everyone was included in the hype it caused.

Similarly, what is needed for BCCI and other sponsors to do is to increase the amount of viewership through proper advertisements which would engage more people to watch and appreciate the game, for more of younger girls to make these female cricketers their idols and aspire to play for the team like many young boys in our country dream. 

 

 

If the economic aspect to solve this gap in pay is to be seen, this is the way that should be adopted to popularize the female version of the sport. Yet, it never answers the question of how biased income levels are. The women are training as much, working as hard as they can, playing immensely good, have been able to qualify for the world cup as well – they are as good as the men, and probably even better if the two teams were to ever compete or even train together!

When we raise our voices to protest against income gap based on gender in other sectors of our countries which affect us, we should protest against this as well.

Pay all genders equally, only then can a nation rise respectably in the eyes of not only half its population which enjoys the privileges, but in the eyes of both!