After the Indian cricket team's successful tour of Pakistan, it is now the turn of the Indian snooker fraternity to host a five-member Pakistan team in the Rs 300,000 prize-money Rexello Castors Indo-Pak Peace Cup Snooker Tournament at Chandigarh from June 17-20.
"It is going to be a very exciting tournament as India and Pakistan have the world's best snooker players, like current world champion Pankaj Advani (India) and world No. 2 Saleh Muhammad (Pakistan)", Indian national billiards and snooker champion Alok Kumar said in a statement in Mumbai on Monday.
"The tournament will also generate a lot of people to people contact and goodwill between the two countries", he added.
Pakistan Billiards and Snooker Association president Ali Asghar Valika said: "We sincerely feel that the exchange of such events should continue for the promotion of the game within the subcontinent and the people who are responsible for arranging such tournaments should be encouraged in every possible way.
"This is an excellent step forward in strengthening the sporting ties between the two countries, and looking at the world class players from both sides, it will be an engrossing tourney," he added.
The team for the championship will be selected during the national selection trials, beginning on Tuesday at Bangalore.
The top two cueists from the trials will represent India at the 20th Asian Snooker Championship, to be held in Jordan from June 5 to 10. They will be joined by World amateur snooker champion Pankaj Advani, who gets an automatic entry.
The Pakistan team will comprise Saleh Muhammad, Muhammad Yousaf, Khurram Agha and Naveen Parwani while the fifth player is yet to be decided by the PBSA, the statement said.
There will be singles as well as doubles matches and each match will be of three frames. Points will be assigned to each match and the team with maximum points at the end of the tournament will be declared the winner.
The total budget of the tournament is Rs 1.6 million, the statement added.
