Suggest 2 retired judges to administer MCA, says Bombay HC

Mumbai: The Bombay high court on Tuesday directed all parties, including the Mumbai Cricket Association (MCA) and the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), to suggest two names of retired Supreme Court and high court judges who could work as administrators and implement the apex court order and recommendations of the Justice R.M. Lodha’s committee as per the amended constitution in managing the MCA’s affairs.

The court was hearing a petition alleging that the present managing committee of the MCA had overstayed its tenure and cannot work anymore.

The division bench of Justice Shantanu Kemkar and Justice M.S. Karnik has directed the parties to suggest the names by Wednesday.

The court sought for the names of retired judges to look after MCA’s affairs when its counsel A.S. Khandeparkar told the court that a special general meeting had been called on April 16, to approve all the amendments recommended by Justice Lodha’s committee. However, senior counsel Mihir Desai on behalf of Nadeem Memon, a member of one of the sports clubs under the MCA, argued before the court that most of the members of MCA have been automatically disqualified because of the Supreme Court order which has said that any member who held any post for more than 9 years or are older than 70 years is disqualified.

The petition has been filed seeking that the MCA’s managing committee be dissolved over non-implementation of the recommendations of Justice Lodha committee’s report.

According to the petitioner, after the SC order Nationalist CongressParty (NCP) leader Sharad Pawar resigned from the MCA president’s post and Dilip Vengsarkar resigned from vice-president’s post. However, there are more members in the MCA who have been disqualified by the SC order and hence they cannot hold meetings.

The bench was of the opinion that the SC order was passed in 2016, and MCA had enough time to implement it but it had not taken any measures for the same. “You have been seeing extensions even though the deadline fixed by the apex court for implementation of the recommendations is already over,” observed Justice Kemkar.

During the hearing, the BCCI suggested to the court that the model adopted by the Delhi high court and the Andhra Pradesh high court of appointing administrators for the Delhi and Hyderabad cricket association should be adopted here too.