On December 12, 2017, the Committee of Administrators met at the National Cricket Academy in Bengaluru. High on the agenda was the need to transform the NCA into a world-class facility. Apart from COA members—chairman Vinod Rai and Diana Edulji—and BCCI CEO Rahul Johri and CFO Santosh Rangnekar, former India captains Dilip Vengsarkar, Rahul Dravid and Shanta Rangaswamy were also invited. The newly appointed COO of NCA, Tufan Ghosh, too, was present along with other BCCI officials involved in its operations.
Decisions related to “crystallisation of BCCI vision for new NCA facility” and plans for developing and constructing a new NCA facility outside Bengaluru were taken. But what stood out was the last decision: “A ladies washroom/toilet should be constructed at the NCA and completed before January 3, 2018”, read the minutes of the meeting.
It is shocking that such basic facilities have been absent till now. The NCA is presently located at the Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru. Quite a number of injured women cricketers like Smriti Mandhana and Harmanpreet Kaur have undergone rehab at the NCA in past few months.
As per information received from the BCCI, the ladies' facility was constructed on time at the NCA as per the instructions and efforts are on to make a larger one soon.
The point is not about providing such basic facilities quickly. These should have been made available much earlier, by the cricket administrators who fiercely safeguard their domain and coffers. Just imagine the lack of similar facilities at the state and district levels.
Post N. Srinivasan era, there has been more focus on women cricketers—first when Anurag Thakur took charge as the BCCI president and later when the CoA decided on getting full-time qualified team managers and support staff for the women's team.
But a lot more needs to be done. There are innumerable examples of lack of clean washrooms and toilets for women in many cricket stadia; media work areas included. Even if the washrooms are there, water and availability of basic sanitation facilities are absent. At the domestic level, in cricket stadia which are not located in main centres, these have been a big issue. There was once an (in)famous example of the entire Ranji Trophy squad coming out of its dressing room, to allow a lone woman journalist reporting on the match to use the facilities inside. In an international Test match held last year, makeshift facilities were made for female journalists and commentators. In one Test venue last year, the women's washroom in press box was locked as it was not by any means in a usable state.
As more state associations invest in modern infrastructure, provision of functioning, clean, hygienic toilets stocked with basic requirements like toilet paper and hand wash should be one of the priorities.
