sports national
to him and I don’t think Anurag Thakur has that kind of brain to
fight with the judiciary and stand against it. With due respect
to Arun Jaitely’s knowledge of law I think he (Anurag Thakur)
needs to go and refresh his knowledge of law.
Board. Therefore, states which have more than one vote are
at the advantageous position and hence are dominant into the
BCCI managing committee and other administrative positions
of the BCCI.
Some sections of the people are talking about the whole
episode becoming Chief Justice TS Thakur versus BCCI Chief
Anurag Thakur.
Cricketing greats like Sunil Gavaskar and Kapil Dev have
also questioned about the one state one vote system. Any
comment on their stand?
Look! I am not going to be judgmental about the working of
Supreme Court any more. I think its Supreme Court versus all
the loopholes of BCCI. As I said earlier, the BCCI will have to fall
in line and follow the judgment of Apex court.
With due respect to both great players and individuals and
it was great to be with them when India won the World Cup
in 1983. But, this time, I think they don’t know the hypocrisy
involved in India cricket. I think they also don’t know about the
number of states in the playing position and to represent India
in world cricket.
But, some of the Lodha Committee’s recommendations like
age capping, one state one vote etc have split the cricket
greats too?
In my opinion, Lodha C ommittee is spot on when it talks about
age capping and one state one vote. In all walks of life, there
is a time when people retire, so what’s wrong if the Lodha
Committee recommends about the age capping for cricket
administrators? People there at the BCCI are not ready to vacate
because there is lot of money, free publicity and reputation
across the India. So, they are only enjoying all the perks instead
of exploring cricket dimension.
Similarly, one state one vote pattern would bring equality for
all states and nullify any probable due advantage to some of
the states like Maharashtra, Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh and West
Bengal. You would be astonished to know that six out of seven
eastern states don’t have the membership of the BCCI. Bihar,
which is third most populous state of India, is one of those six
eastern states.
Kindly elaborate your stand on the one vote one state
recommendation.
Look. One vote one state would pave way for membership to
the BCCI for all Indian states which is not the case today. States
like Maharashtra have four votes while Gujarat, Andhra Pradesh
and West Bengal have 3, 2 and 2 votes respectively. Then you
have universities who don’t play at all. You have two government
offices like Railways and Services who also constitute the BCCI
And what about the three member selection committee not
enough to represent the whole nation?
All these arguments are baseless. If this is correct then why
there is zonal rotation? When you have five selectors from five
zones, are you making zonal India team or national India team?
You have selectors in the state too. They can easily accumulate
to the youngsters who can come up to play at national level.
The Lodha Committee has recommended setting aside the
politicians. You are both politician and cricket administrator.
If the recommendations are implemented, what would you
choose?
What Lodha Committee has recommended through keeping
politicians away from cricket administration is to showcase the
ministers and government officials supported by their ministers
being involved into this whole malpractice. Simply being a
member parliament doesn’t mean you should be barred from
the BCCI governing body.
But, yes, being a cricketer, I have represented my country and
have retired from all forms of cricket. Today, I don’t get enough
time for my constituency and hence I would prefer to continue
in politics and let the BCCI activities being taken care of by the
new and younger people.
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should allow the Board to decide on issues it knows the best
about and insist on transparency in the administration.
All that needs to be done is to call for the audited accounts
of the state associations and get them scrutinised by the
Comptroller and Auditor General of India, which the Board in
any case has accepted, leaving the number of selectors and one
state one vote for the Board to decide on.
Yes, the issue of the age limit must be insisted on and as
for the cap on term of office it should ask the Board to follow
its old rule that no president will have more than one term of
three years and the secretary of five years without getting into
a cooling-off period before another term.
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November 16-30, 2016 The Dayafter
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