PCB not giving full evidence: Younus’ lawyer

LAHORE: Younus Khan’s lawyer has lashed out against the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) for not providing full evidence against the former captain as promised prior to the appeal-hearing process.

“The PCB is not cooperating with us fully and haven’t given us all the evidence that we need,” Ahmed Qayyum told The Express Tribune. “I was only showed the inquiry video tapes, in which 18 people were investigated and that’s all but there are no concrete documents on on which they imposed the ban.” Ahmed was surprised by the PCB’s action against the player – an indefinite ban – in the absence of ‘concrete evidence’. “Each recording is over an hour long.

That means it goes on for about 24 hours and it’s not feasible to hear and see all of them but in the ones that were showed during the appeal session, nobody spoke against my client.” The PCB, however, maintained the stance that they were providing the evidence that the judge over-seeing proceedings had advised them to. “We were directed by Judge Irfan Qadir only to show them the evidence that we have,” said PCB legal advisor Taffazul Rizvi. “If they want to take a look at all the documents then they should come up with a tribunal order.”

The PCB constituted an evaluation committee to assess and evaluate Pakistan’s performance after the disastrous tour of Australia. “I’m wondering, according to which law the committee undertook the investigation because I don’t see any evidence that can justify the punishment Younus has received.” Since the committee was formed to investigate the Australian tour only, the documents received also mentioned the New Zealand tour, of which Younus wasn’t even part of.

“Therefore, we’re oblivious to the facts used to give out the punishment.” The PCB allowed the players to lodge their appeals which are being heard by Qadir. Mohammad Yousuf was the only punished player from the list of seven who did not appeal against the PCB’s decision.