A miffed Supreme Court said that it would pass orders on Friday to fix the mess in the Indian cricket board after the BCCI stayed defiant and refused to commit that it would implement the reforms sugg
A miffed Supreme Court said that it would pass orders on Friday to fix the mess in the Indian cricket board after the BCCI stayed defiant and refused to commit that it would implement the reforms suggested by the court-appointed Justice Lodha Committee. The court also threatened to change the cricket board’s leadership if the reforms were not accepted.
The court’s move came after BCCI counsel Kapil Sibal said he would respond on October 17, when the courts reopen after Dussehra as an undertaking would not be possible in a day as 25 state associations were involved.
A bench headed by Chief Justice of India T.S. Thakur warned that the BCCI would be asked to stop all payments to state associations for hosting Ranji Trophy and other domestic matches if the cricket board and its members did not accept the reforms. “If matches are to be conducted, they will be held in a transparent manner. We will not allow a penny to be wasted. Objectivity and transparency is more important,” the CJI said.
The court had formed the Lodha committee in January 2015 after the 2013 IPL spot-fixing and betting scandal. The court later accepted most of the recommendations it had made and asked the BCCI to implement them.
But the richest sports body in the world last month refused to accept some of the suggestions, including an age cap and cooling-off period for administrators, a one-state one-vote policy and a 15-day window before and after the IPL.
Amicus curiae Gopal Subramanian said BCCI president Anurag Thakur did not appear before the panel, headed by retired CJI R.M. Lodha, despite several reminders sent to him, and sought civil and criminal contempt proceedings against him.
When Mr Sibal said that most state associations had not accepted the recommendations, and the BCCI had no power to force them, the CJI said the cricket board would have to elect new administrators or the court would dismiss them and appoint new ones.
“We cannot continue wasting our time on the BCCI. We have other things to do. We have people languishing in jails. Their cases are more important for us,” the CJI said.
When Mr Sibal said Anurag Thakur, also a BJP leader, was a Ranji Trophy player (he played one game for Himachal Pradesh), the CJI said: “We are all cricketers here. I also led the Supreme Court XI against the Bar Association XI of lawyers in one match.”
The CJI also indicted the BCCI for giving '400 crores to state associations despite the Lodha panel’s objections.
The BCCI should have exercised transparency, as such an amount could not be disbursed overnight, he said.
“You must not create a defiant attitude. This is not going to lead you anywhere,” he said, adding that the funds the cricket board was generously distributing was “public money”.
