Full members of the BCCI were far from enthusiastic to take the big step towards implementing the Supreme Court order of July 18, 2016 with regard to the Justice Lodha Committee reforms in cricket report.
In fact, the Special General Meeting, convened to consider a seven-item agenda, including the implementation of the order, ended in disappointment for the acting BCCI secretary Amitabh Choudhary and the Maharashrtra Cricket Association president Abhay Apte.
These two were in the vanguard of the initiative, but they came under pressure from a section that did not want to bypass the decision taken by a BCCI SGM on October 1, 2016, wherein full members had taken a call on each and every recommendation made by the Justice Lodha Committee. The outcome of that SGM has been submitted to the Supreme Court.
Eventually, today’s SGM decided to appoint a seven-member committee to examine some recommendations that majority of the members find unacceptable. Listed first on the agenda, the implementation of the Supreme Court order of July 18, 2016, was taken up last.
A visibly downcast Choudhary said: “The house deliberated in every detail the principal order of the Supreme Court and with a view to complete the implementation process, it constituted a committee which will examine how best it can quickly implement. It will be constituted tomorrow and should have its first recommendations in a fortnight’s time. It will be sent to the Committee of Administrators (CoA), which will thereafter decide the course of action.”
Choudhary and Apte, who were hopeful of getting a resolution adopted on Mondsay itself, with a rider of seeking relief from a handful of recommendations, were let down by a large group that had assured it support in the last 48 hours, including N. Srinivasan, the former BCCI President and representative of the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association.
Dramatic development
Things changed dramatically overnight, and the moment it was conveyed to Choudhary and Apte that Srinivasan and those who have demonstrated unflinching loyalty to him for a long time were in no mood to budge from the decisions taken on October 1, 2016.
The seven-member committee may look into issues like (1) One State, one member, one vote rule; (2) cooling-off period of three years after every term; (3) age cap of 70 for officer-bearers and councillors; (4) nine-year tenure restriction rule; and (5) restoring the selection committee to five members.
