Pakistan Cricket Board chief Rameez Raja will visit India next month to attend an International Cricket Council meeting in Mumbai and hopes to use the opportunity to persuade all concerned for resumption of bilateral cricket ties.
Raja admitted that he was at first reluctant to make the trip for the September 17-20 ICC Cricket Committee Management meeting but then changed his mind, reportedly at the instance of cricketer-turned-commentator Sanjay Manjarekar, who is currently in Karachi to cover the Pakistan-Bangladesh Test series.
"Initially I was reluctant to attend the meeting because of the international matches in Pakistan and also because normally cricket officials from Pakistan have not been issued visas to visit India for any purpose," the former skipper was quoted as saying by The News on Thursday.
"But now I have changed my mind and we have sent the visa application for processing. I believe given the media interest that will surround the meeting it is the best time to get across Pakistan's point of view to Indians in India on cricket relations with them," he said.
"Pakistan has been willing to play India and we believe that ties should be resumed as early as next year.
"It certainly is a good opportunity to visit India and meet important Indian officials and cricketers and get our point of view across to them," Raja said.
The meeting will be attended by chief executives of all the ICC Test-playing nations.
Raja's visit will serve another purpose.
"I will also have discussions with New Zealand Cricket Chief Executive Martin Snedden and try to give final shape and confirmation to the New Zealand team's five-match one-day international series in Pakistan in November."
New Zealand have yet to give final consent to the proposal to play back to back one-dayers in Lahore and Rawalpindi in the last ten days of November.
The PCB has been forced to schedule back to back matches because of the holy month of Ramazan and Eid holiday falling on either November 25 or 26.
