VDCA president and former ACA president D.V. Subba Rao and noted sports writer and commentator A. Prasanna Kumar on Thursday vehemently denied the allegations made against them in the backdrop of ACA and VDCA elections.
Mr. Subba Rao said it was regrettable that the allegations were made against him just a day before the election of office-bearers of VDCA.
He said he was never interested in power, always stayed neutral and his only concern was cricket and cricket in Visakhapatnam. Discussion on unanimous elections went on for many days and he did not endorse nomination papers of VDCA secretary K. Parthasaradhi and vice-president Vishnu Kumar Raju for the ACA posts because he would be identified with one group if he did so. Mr. Subba Rao said his idea was that he should be in the ACA to protect Visakhapatnam's interest while the present group could exert pressure from the VDCA.
If something unforeseen happened Visakhapatnam would not have any say, and this was explained to the VDCA office-bearers, he said. He was keen to see Visakhapatnam received Test venue status as soon as possible and get VDCA its due from ACA. Cordial relationship between ACA and VDCA should prevail.
He was offered to get unanimously elected but later his nomination was hotly contested, and now he was asked to withdraw from the VDCA elections, Mr. Subba Rao said.
On the Election Officer for ACA elections allowing Prof. Prasanna Kumar's nominee to participate in the elections after rejecting the nominee decided by the VCC general body meeting, Mr. Subba Rao said the Election Officer and VC and MD of SAAP who was appointed by the court, wanted the club to show proof of removal of Prof. Prasanna Kumar which it could not produce.
‘Baseless'
Prof. Prasanna Kumar said there was no truth in the allegations made by Mr. Narayanaswami. He did not propose Mr. Narayanaswami because he wanted to contest against Mr. Parthasaradhi for the VDCA secretary's post. Proposing one would mean opposing the other, but he would support Mr. Narayanaswami even now if he contested for the vice-president's post again, Prof. Prasanna Kumar said. Many people strongly believed that differences between Mr. Narayanaswami and Mr. Parthasaradhi were affecting VDCA functioning, he said.
No meeting was held (on July 11) during which he was removed as president and no notice about convening the meeting was issued to members nor his explanation was sought, Prof. Prasanna Kumar said.
