By Amlan Chakraborty

Copyright independent

India capped their unbeaten Asia Cup campaign by defeating arch rivals Pakistan in Sunday’s final but refused to collect the trophy in a bizarre end to a politically charged cricket tournament.

Indian captain Suryakumar Yadav said his team were denied the chance to hoist the trophy as it was removed from the presentation ceremony following their refusal to accept it from Mohsin Naqvi, interior minister of Pakistan and chairman of the Asian Cricket Council.

Pakistani captain Salman Agha said India had “disrespected cricket”.

India beat Pakistan by five wickets in the final at the Dubai International Stadium. The match was held amid heightened tensions between the two countries following a brief military conflict in May that left dozens of people dead.

The teams met three times at the tournament and Indian players refused to shake the hands of their opponents throughout.

The final ended in bizarre circumstances with India celebrating their win by hoisting an imaginary trophy.

The presentation ceremony was first delayed, prompting speculation as to the reason, and then cut short just before the winner’s trophy was about to be handed over.

“I have been informed by the Asian Cricket Council that the Indian cricket team will not be collecting their awards,” Simon Doull, who conducted the presentation, announced.

Indian cricket board secretary Devajit Saikia confirmed their players refused to receive the trophy from Naqvi.

“We have decided not to take the Asia Cup trophy from the ACC chairman, who happens to be one of the main leaders of Pakistan,” Saikia told news agency ANI.

Naqvi is also the chairperson of the Pakistan Cricket Board.

“So we decided not to take it from him. But that does not mean the gentleman will take away the trophy with him along with the medals. So it is very unfortunate and we hope that the trophy and the medals will be returned to India as soon as possible. There is an ICC conference in November in Dubai. In the next conference, we are going to launch a very serious and very strong protest against the act of the ACC chairperson.”

“I think this is one thing that I’ve never seen since I started playing cricket, and started following cricket, that a champion team is denied a trophy, that too a hard-earned one,” Yadav told reporters later. “I feel we deserved it. I can’t say anything more, I’ve summed it up really well. My trophies are sitting in the dressing room, all the 14 guys with me, the support staff, those are the real trophies throughout this journey in the Asia Cup.”

Some local news outlets reported that the organisers left the ceremony with the Asia Cup trophy after the Indian team refused to take it.

Tempers were frayed and emotions ran high as the two teams met for the first time in the tournament on 14 September and again a few days later.

Yadav referred to the military conflict in May and dedicated his team’s victory against Pakistan in the 14 September match to the armed forces back home.

After the final, Yadav said all that mattered was that India were champions once again.

“The win is important. If you saw after the match, ‘India’ was written on the big screen. ‘Asia Cup 2025 Champions’ What’s better than this? You play for that,” he said.

Agha, the Pakistan captain, said India had disrespected cricket. “What India have done in this tournament is disappointing,” he said.

“They’re not disrespecting us by not shaking hands, they’re disrespecting cricket. Good teams don’t do what they did today. We went to pose with the trophy on our own because we wanted to fulfil our obligations. We stood there and took our medals.”

The Pakistan Cricket Board announced that they would donate the team’s match fees to the civilians killed during the conflict with India.

This came after Yadav announced he would donate his match fee to the victims on the Indian side.

For several years now, India and Pakistan have been playing each other only at neutral venues during international tournaments, a consequence of the long-running hostility between the two nations.

That animosity flared again earlier this year when both sides claimed victory after four days of fighting that left more than 70 people dead in missile strikes, drone attacks and military fire.

India described its airstrikes on Pakistan, which launched the conflict, as “Operation Sindoor”, the Hindi word for vermilion traditionally worn by married Hindu women.

The strikes came after New Delhi accused Pakistan of involvement in a 22 April attack in the restive Himalayan territory of Kashmir which left nearly two dozen people dead, mostly Hindu tourists. Islamabad denied the allegation and demanded an independent investigation.

“OperationSindoor on the games field,” Indian prime minister Narendra Modi said on X after Sunday’s win. “Outcome is the same – India wins! Congrats to our cricketers.”

Naqvi promptly responded. “If war was your measure of pride, history already records your humiliating defeats at Pakistan’s hands,” he said.

“Dragging war into sport only exposes desperation and disgraces the very spirit of the game,” he said.

Social media saw mixed reactions as the South Asian political rivalry overshadowed the game.

One X user told Modi that every Indian was happy about the victory but “it is extremely tone deaf of you, the prime minister, to call a cricket match Operation Sindoor”.

Historian Ramachandra Guha told The Wire that Modi had “diminished his office and our country by his post on Asia Cup”.

The opposition Congress party also criticised Modi for his X post. “Sometimes I doubt if PM Modi has any knowledge of foreign policy and diplomacy,” party spokesperson Atul Londhe Patil said in Maharashtra. “If we played, we should have played with sportsman spirit. If Operation Sindoor is ongoing, then we shouldn’t have played.”

Former Pakistani cricketer Kamran Akmal said that his country’s cricket board should immediately announce that they would never play against India.

“Pakistan board should immediately say that ‘we should never play against India’. Let’s see what action ICC takes. What else evidence do you need after this?” Akmal told the media outlet ARY News.

“But the BCCI person is leading the ICC, how will he take any action?” he added, referring to International Cricket Council chief Jay Shah, the son of Indian home minister Amit Shah.

“The other boards have to come together, say we can’t see this in cricket. Sports is not played at anyone’s home. If others don’t play them, then no money is going to come.”