By the look of it, the private lives of Indian cricketers happen to be more private than is the case with their counterparts elsewhere in the cricketing world. Also, the threat — perceived or otherwise — to their lives is also more acute than what is faced by lesser mortals. These are two conclusions one can reach without much of an effort by the manner in which the anti-doping row has unfolded in recent days.

Every single country under the ICC umbrella has signed the protocol charted out by the World Anti-Doping Agency (Wada) except India. Other international sporting bodies have put their signatures on the dotted line except India and unless it does, the ICC as a body cannot be considered as a signatory to the Wada protocol. Ironically, all the sporting associations within India have signed their consent except the Board of Control for Cricket India (BCCI).

Lying at the heart of the debate is the International Registered Testing Pool (IRTP) clause which requires players who are nominated for random testing based on their ICC rankings to inform the ICC at the beginning of every quarter of the year, a location and time that they will be available for an hour each day in that quarter for testing. If a player changes his schedule in between, then he needs to update the whereabouts information to the relevant official either online or even through SMS.

However, if the player is not in the location at the time specified, he will have a strike recorded against his name. Three such strikes and the player will have breached the code and can face suspension from the game for up to two years.

The BCCI and the players say they are worried about security risks involved in providing whereabouts information in advance and have also said that the clause is a violation of privacy. It has even quoted guarantees related to privacy and freedom of movement offered by the country’s constitution. This is hilarious stuff really, for it implies that India is the only country on the planet that has a constitution guaranteeing such things, or it is the only country that respects its constitution.

Some of the players have come up with their own set of nonsense. Yuvraj Singh is one who tried to make out a case for treating cricketers differently from other sportsmen. “Their sports and our sport is different,” he was quoted as having said in an interview. “We play more and we get very little time with our families and I feel we are travelling more. We are playing a lot in a year and we should be given more space, with due respect to other sports,” he added

“After nine months of playing, we come home for just ten days… We don’t want somebody to intrude upon our privacy for dope tests during that small period.”

One wonders if the Indians are the only players busy on the circuit. Take Yuvraj’s words on face value and they would mean just that. Practically speaking, what he is saying is that only the Indian cricketers remain busy for long stretches of time while those who have signed up spend more time at home. At best, this is flimsy.

There is no contention to the fact that the new Wada regulations are tough and somewhat impractical in view of the fast-paced lifestyle of a modern sportsperson. There have been others like Serena Williams who have raised their voice against it, but they are not holding their respective associations at gunpoint which the Indians are trying to do by suggesting that the ICC should walk out of Wada and put in place a cricket-specific anti-doping mechanism.

If happenings of the last decade or so are anything to go by, the BCCI loves to be the odd one out in the ICC every single time it can. With around two-third of the money in the game having some kind of Indian link, the BCCI loves to boss around. Now with the IPL goldmine adding to its financial power which has taken money beyond the ICC and the various cricketing boards right down to the players themselves, the BCCI is loving every moment of global spotlight that it can possibly have with or without a valid reason.

The ICC has been conducting anti-doping tests at its events since 2002, but became a Wada signatory four years later. The updated code was approved last year by the ICC board and it was done unanimously with the BCCI fully on board. Now it has no qualms about going back on its words which is hardly the stuff of rational leadership.

Having missed the first deadline — July 31 — the Indian players in the testing pool face the first of the three strikes against their names. In case the BCCI succeeds in getting a waiver for its players, the Federation of International Cricketers’ Associations (Fica) has already warned that if the ICC does not penalise India’s players, it would ensure that players from all other countries would be relieved from similar obligations.

Fissures within the cricketing fraternity and global isolation for the game by forcing the ICC to walk out of Wada are two serious risks posed by the Indian penchant for hogging the global limelight.