Secretary Devajit Saikia said on Wednesday that the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) won’t change the controversial policy limiting family time for its international men’s cricketers, despite the recent candid criticism from Virat Kohli. Saikia said the policy was ‘paramount’ for both ‘the nation’ and the board, adding that it wasn’t an overnight decision but an update to similar directives from the previous century. The reports about such rules (they were never made public by the BCCI) came after India lost the 2024-25 Border-Gavaskar Trophy to Australia. They said that for every 45-day long tour, families would be allowed two weeks with the cricketer, except under special circumstances when the board permitted them. It was accompanied by other rules, which mandated players to travel together, reduce their luggage and so on. “At this stage, the current policy will remain intact, as it is of paramount importance to both the nation and our institution, the BCCI,” Saikia told Cricbuzz in an interview. “The BCCI recognises that there may be some resentment or differing opinions, as in a democratic setup, people are entitled to express their views. The policy is applied uniformly to all team members – players, coaches, managers, support staff, and everyone involved – and has been implemented with the best interests of everyone in mind,” the secretary who recently replaced Jay Shah in the position said. “This policy has not been formulated overnight; it has been in place for decades, dating back to the playing days of our president, Roger Binny – and possibly even earlier,” he said. “The new policy is an amendment of the previous one, with additional provisions regarding players’ presence at practice sessions, match schedules, tours, luggage, team movements, and other ancillary activities, all aimed at the objective of team cohesion and unity,” he added. Speaking at an event organised by his IPL franchise Royal Challengers Bengaluru, Kohli said that he was ‘quite disappointed’ by it and felt the decision-makers lacked understanding of players’ needs. “If you ask any player, do you want your family to be around you all the time? They’ll be like, yes. I don’t want to go to my room and just sit alone and sulk. I want to be able to be normal… It is very difficult to explain to people how grounding it is to come back to your family every time you have something intense happening on the outside I don’t think people have an understanding of what value it brings. I feel quite disappointed about that. People who have no control over what is going on are kind of brought into conversations and put out in the forefront. Maybe they need to be kept away,” the high-profile cricketer added. Kohli is the only current player who has spoken about the subject with this honesty in public.