The severity of air pollution and dense Smog cover in the capital on Sunday led to the cancellation of the two Ranji Trophy encounters — Bengal and Gujarat at the Feroz Shah Kotla Stadium and Hyderabad vs Tripura at the Karnail Singh Stadium.
While Gujarat team will be leaving Delhi on Monday for Ahmedabad, Bengal team will be staying back till Tuesday before flying off to Rajkot for the next game against Tamil Nadu.
The BCCI in a media release stated that both matches will be rescheduled.
"The Technical Committee of the BCCI recognised the extraordinary circumstances prevailing in Delhi and decided to re-schedule the Paytm Ranji Trophy 2016-17 fifth round matches between Hyderabad-Tripura and Gujarat-Bengal after the first two days of play were lost due to smog conditions in New Delhi.
"The revised venue and dates for the above matches which will be played after the league phase of Ranji trophy, will be announced shortly."
The situation was not expected to improve for a few more days which effectively ruled out any chance of play. Match referee P Ranganathan, in consultation with BCCI and the respective state associations, decided that there is no point in waiting for two more days.
"This is unavoidable and unforeseen circumstances. This cannot be considered as a match. So there is no question of sharing points," match referee P Ranganathan said.
It's a first of its kind in Ranji Trophy where a match has been cancelled in its entirety due to prevailing pollution level in the national capital.
"We are going back to Kolkata tomorrow morning. It's unfortunate but it is nobody's fault," Bengal manager Sameer Dasgupta said.
The Bengal players were seen wearing anti-pollution masks as they left the venue.
Bengal captain Manoj Tiwary spoke about the health hazards due to the condition in Delhi.
"This is something unbelievable in my 11 years of first-class cricket. The situation is so bad that one can't see anything as we go back from Kotla to our team hotel. You can't spot cars and buses from a distance. The government must step in and do something about it. The health of the common man is paramount and you simply can't breathe polluted air," Tiwary said.