inAs a former cricketer, I cannot see even a faint resemblance of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) that I represented and the board that is currently occupied by some self-serving freeloaders. The current crop neither has respect for the game nor players, neither for law nor law enforcers. Times have changed. When we came back after winning the World Cup in 1983, the board did not have the money to acknowledge our contribution, but NKP Salve organised a Lata Mangeshkar concert and raised some money for us. We were over the moon.
Money has come in, not because of the administrators but because of the passionate audience, because of the eyeballs glued to the action in the middle. TV rights have swelled the BCCI coffers. Rather than looking after the interest of the spectators, these self-serving officials keep indulging in self-congratulatory applause. Board and state units, it’s a mutual admiration society. The board patronises the state units when they know that money is being swindled and is not reaching the intended beneficiaries and that the avowed objective of developing the game is not being met.
Rootless politicians and mediocre businessmen have come to occupy the BCCI and state associations by adopting dubious methods. It was, therefore, important that the Justice Lodha Committee recommendations were accepted by the Supreme Court. Amicus curiae, Gopal Subramanian gave specific details about the defiant attitude of BCCI, which has been dragging its feet on deploying the Lodha panel recommendations made binding on the board on July 18.
It was shameful that the board failed its first deadline of September 30 by which it had to implement the Memorandum of Association and Rules. It was equally shocking to hear that the BCCI had been steadfastly opposing the Lodha committee’s one-state-one-vote proposal, age and tenure caps, saying it was governed by the Tamil Nadu Societies Registration Act, 1975 and not a Supreme Court-appointed committee. The BCCI currently consists of 30 affiliates with multiple voting units from Maharashtra and Gujarat. The Lodha panel was rightly against this policy since it helped form cliques and led to assuming of systematic control of BCCI by a few people who kept perpetuating themselves in office.
BCCI’s response that the state units are independent entities and have to be persuaded to fall in line is the height of arrogance. The board has transferred close to `400 crore as infrastructural grants to its state units till September-end. It is obvious that the BCCI has been instigating the state units to oppose the Lodha reforms. In fact, I produced a letter by two office-bearers of DDCA, who have complained to the BCCI president that action should be taken against a seven- member group of office-bearers who have approached the Delhi High Court seeking the implementation of the Supreme Court judgment. In effect this means that state associations are being encouraged to defy the apex court, by not implementing its judgment.
The Supreme Court has started its clean-up act in right earnest. They have dealt a decisive blow to the BCCI by ordering the defiant board not to release funds to state associations till such bodies file affidavits that they will abide by the Justice Lodha Committee recommendations. The apex court has also asked BCCI President Anurag Thakur to file a personal affidavit on details of his conversation with the ICC chief regarding Lodha recommendations.
It seems that the Supreme Court will utilise the one-week break to chalk out a back-up plan to keep cricket moving and also see the back of the Indo-Kiwis series underway currently. BCCI will have to implement the judgment in toto. It has no choice.kirtiazad.mp@gmail.com