Board of Control for Cricket in India president Shashank Manohar, who chaired an Emergent Meeting of the Indian Premier League's General Council here on Monday, said:
“IPL is a great property and is loved by all across the globe. The commercial aspect of such an event is an important thing. However, ethics and transparency are more important. But since the last 15 days there were lot of allegations and counter-allegations made through the media, the BCCI looked into the allegations levelled and took a decision to issue a show-cause notice to Lalit Modi, pending an enquiry and decided to suspend him. But as the tournament was on, we never wanted it to be disrupted or any problems created.
“The show-cause notice was sent only after the presentation ceremony was over. And thereafter Mr. Modi was suspended. After receiving a reply from Mr. Modi, the BCCI will hold an enquiry into the matter if necessary, or if the reply of Mr. Modi convinces the members, the proceedings will be dropped. An Emergent GC meeting was called today because we didn't want the tournament to be disrupted or disturbed by any of the actions of the Board because the IPL is a valuable property. We discussed the charge sheet and also took a unanimous decision to appoint Chirayu Amin as the interim chairman,” Mr. Manohar said.
At the BCCI's AGM in September 2009, Messrs. Mr. Manohar, Mr. Amin and Arun Jaitley were named as the Disciplinary Committee members.
The GC will meet in June after all the preliminary findings are done because most of the members of the Governing Council are unaware of the things happening.
The GC also delegated Mansur Ali Khan Pataudi, Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri (all IPL GC members) to look into all cricketing matters. Initially, they will meet the franchisees and thereafter recommend to the GC the number of overseas and Indian players they will be allowed to retain from the IPL 4 season. At a GC meeting last December, franchises were given the option of withholding three foreign and four Indian cricketers.
With the auction for the IPL 4 to be held after the Airtel Champions League in South Africa (September 12-26), the three cricketers will also be asked to set a base price for the cricketers and also review matters related to strategic timeout.
Still chairman: Modi
PTI reports:
Undeterred by his suspension as the IPL boss, a combative Mr. Modi sought to put up a brave face by maintaining, through his tweet, that he was still the chairman of the Twenty20 league and was merely suspended for the time being.
“Thank you all for your message of support. It is really appreciated. I am still chairman of IPL. Just suspended. Wait — we have just begun,” Mr. Modi tweeted.
