Equal work equal pay. But does one get money only for work??

The BCCI announcement of equal pay for men and women cricket players has been cheered almost by everyone.?Let us explore the salary structure of BCCI for both men and women:

Indian Cricket Players Grade and Salary (Men’s)

The Men Cricket pay is divided into four categories: Grade A+, Grade A, Grade B and Grade C.?

Grade A+ (Rs 7 Crore)

Virat Kohli, Rohit Sharma, Jasprit Bumrah.

Grade A (Rs 5 Crore):

Ajinkya Rahane, Cheteshwar Pujara, Hardik Pandya, Ishant Sharma, KL Rahul, Mohammed Shami, Shikhar Dhawan, Rishabh Pant, Ravindra Jadeja, Ravichandran Ashwin.

Grade B (Rs 3 Crore):

Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Mayank Agarwal, Shardul Thakur, Umesh Yadav, Wriddhiman Saha.

Grade C (Rs 1 Crore):

Axar Patel, Deepak Chahar, Hanuma Vihari, Kuldeep Yadav, Mohammed Siraj, Navdeep Saini, Shreyas Iyer, Shubman Gill, Washington Sundar, Yuzvendra Chahal.

Going through the list of BCCI Grade A+ to Grade C player list and their respective compensation, it seems to be doing a good job for men’s cricket but men’s cricket only.?What are the various grade level pay for women’s cricket?

Indian Cricket Players Grade And Salary (Women’s)

Grade A (Rs 50 Lakhs):

Mithali Raj, Harmanpreet Kaur, Smirit Mandhana, Poonam Yadav.

Grade B (Rs 30 Lakhs):

Ekta Bisht, Jhulan Goswami, Shikha Pandey, Deepti Sharma, Jemimah Rodrigues.

Grade C (Rs 10 Lakhs):

Radha Yadav, D Hemalatha, Anuja Patil, Veda Krishnamurthy, Mansi Joshi, Punam Raut, Mona Meshram, Arundhati Reddy, Rajeshwari Gayakwad, Taniya Bhatia, Pooja Vastrakar.

(the above figures are from a Jan 2022 article on web)

Indian Cricket Players Salary 20222 of Men's and Women's (sportsunfold.com)

Apart from the BCCI annual salary, the players receive an income for playing in every Test, ODI, and T20I match. ?This will now be the same for both men and women. ?Rs 15 lakh for a test match, Rs 6 lakh for a one-day international (ODI), and Rs 3 lakh for a T-20 international match. So salaries will still be different but match playing fees paid by BCCI will be the same.?

In salaries also there is a gradation, which is good but the discrepancy comes out clearly here.?The best women’s player and they are really the best in the world receive less than the Grade C player of men’s cricket. ?What the BCCI has smartly announced is equal fees for matches played but not equal annual salaries.?But should salaries be equal? ?For Grade C, yes, but for grades A+, A, and B there should be a gap between men and women cricketers.?Why not equality here also??

The equality argument is a slippery slope.?Why should cricket players have higher compensation and hockey, badminton, boxing, and shooting players also not receive the same salary as cricket players??

Also, why should Virat receive less compensation than Ronaldo or Messi??Also, why should PV Sindhu receive less compensation than Serena Williams? ?

Well, the answer is simple.?Not all sports are on the same footing. ?Some sports are richer and some are not so rich. The richness of sports depends on:

1.???the participation of the people in the sport which in turn depends on

2.???the understanding of the sport among the people,

3.???the performance of the team in that sport and

4.???the economy of the country in which the sport is popular.?

Chess seems to have the lowest understanding among people and hence the lowest participation and also was popular in the erstwhile low-income communist countries.???Football on the other hand is easier to understand and hence has higher participation and is also the most popular sport in Europe, a rich economy (and hopefully Putin lets it remain so) and hence has higher broadcast income and stadium entry collections.?Cricketers in the Netherlands may not earn as much as their footballers.?The reverse is true in India.?

Cricketers’ especially men, had a great time in the last few decades: rising performance since the 1983 world cup (more ups and fewer downs) coupled with the growth of television, a growing economy, and increasing participation of people by watching on TV and visiting stadiums all over the world.?Compare that to hockey our national sport.?In the most high-profile sports event the Asiad 1982, which bought colour television for India, we lost to Pakistan 7-1 and since then there have been fewer ups and more downs.?

For cricketers, both men’s and women’s teams should have the same facilities as regards travel, stay, practice, physio, nets, coaching and also the same basic pay, the anomaly that BCCI corrected.?In fact, for all sports, the minimum standards must be set.?If the sports body managing the sport is richer, they should provide additional better facilities to their players.?But additional compensation and super bonuses (what the BCCI terms as salaries), should be on the basis of the broadcast money and stadium box office the teams bring the player’s performance, and his seniority

What about Bollywood? The news was even cheered by Bollywoodiyas, from Abhishek Bachchan to Tapsee Pannu.?Some things need clarification.?What does Tapsee expect??She should have received the same compensation as Amitabh Bachchan for the movie Badla and Pink, or the same as Akshay Kumar for Baby??And Disha Patani should receive the same compensation as Salman Khan for Bharat??And Anushka Sharma the same compensation as Shah Rukh Khan for Rab ne Banaa di Jodi and same as Salman Khan for Sultan???The same goes for Abhishek Bachchan.?Should he receive the same compensation as his Mrs?

Salman Khan’s compensation for Sultan included not just money for the hours he put in, but also for his star power then, which bought the audiences to the theatre.?Same for SRK and Akshay Kumar and Amitabh Bachchan.??The day Tapsee Pannu brings more audience to the theatre she will get more compensation than SRK or Salman Khan.

For the hours that one puts in one gets a minimum wage set by the government or the industry.??If the equal work-equal salary argument of heroines is taken forward, they should either receive the same salary as the character or supporting actress or the supporting actress should get the same as the heroines. ?

This is true even for the corporate world also. ?The NETFLIX Culture deck makes it very clear. Netflix Culture Deck - Peter Fisk.?Experience, passion, integrity, and knowledge are some of the things that employees bring on the table.?These things will be valued differently by different employers.

The failure of communism and the relative success of capitalism against it has proven that markets are better arbitrators of price and value than a Jay Shah can ever be, whose being in the post of BCCI secretary is less to do with merit.?But then BCCI is a private AOP, not a government body.?

But one thing remains clear: Vishwanathan Anand is not going to play cricket as it has more money. Every sportsman will stick to the sport he loves, money or no money.??