Reports: A junior member of Team India's support staff accused of ‘inappropriate behavior’ by female hotel staff

India went on a tour to West Indies just after the conclusion of World Cup 2019. Team India played a total of 3 T20Is, 3 ODIs and 2 Tests on that tour. The team came back with optimum results as they won the series in all the formats and Caribbeans were unable to win a single match against the visitors.

But, just before the first Test match, an incident happened in the team hotel where a junior member of the Team India’s support staff was accused of ‘inappropriate behavior’ by female hotel staff in Antigua. The incident was swiftly turned down by the BCCI as a case of mistaken identity.

Security manager and logistics manager did confirm that it was indeed a member of the support staff

The former team manager Sunil Subramaniam had sent a mail regarding the incident happened in Antigua to CoA that such incident did take place and the former manager urged the board to speak to the accused of that incident.

Later a BCCI official acknowledged that incident did take place in the team hotel but said it was a case of mistaken identity, which left the accused free, “It was found out to be a case of mistaken identity once an inquiry was done. The staff with whom the alleged misbehavior happened was shown photographs of all the support staff members but she didn’t identify any of them,” a senior BCCI official said as quoted by India Today.

Subramanium’s tenure as a team manager ended just after the West Indies tour and his position is now handled by Girish Dongre. In his letter that he later withdraw states that, “The culprit is still very much a part of the Indian team, The matter was handled in such a manner that the team and more importantly the concerned member of the team was spared any embarrassment from any entity that would exploit it for obvious reasons. The hotel made a request that we internally take measures to correct such inappropriate behavior,” the former manager added.

“Investigation by the Hotel management, Antiguan Police, Roland Holder of Cricket West Indies and myself along with the team Security manager and logistics manager did confirm that it was indeed a member of the support staff,” he added.

The former Indian manager had played 74 first-class matches in his career and once was himself caught in a storm when an Indian High Commission staff complained during a campaign and was eventually removed from the position.