NEW DELHI: The Indian cricket board on Wednesday doubled the salaries of its contracted players while retaining former skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni in the top pay bracket.

Players holding a Grade A contract will now get an annual retainer fee of $3.05 million instead of the previous $1.71m they were getting since November 2015.

Dhoni, who gave up the limited overs captaincy in January, held the Grade A contract with his successor Virat Kohli and a few other top Indian players for a period ending September 2017.

Cheteshwar Pujara, who scored a double century in the drawn game against Australia in Ranchi, left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja and opener Murali Vijay were the new additions to the top of the three grades.

The cash-rich Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) also hiked the retainer fee for Grade B and C players while increasing the match fee across formats.

Players will now get $23,000 for a Test match, $9,000 in a One-day International and earn $4,000 for a Twenty20 game.

The decision to restructure the central contracts and match fees was taken by the BCCI in conjunction with the Supreme Court appointed Committee of Administrators (CoA).

Published in Dawn, March 23rd, 2017