By all means, the elections to the various posts of the Hyderabad Cricket Association which will be held on Sunday might leave little choice to the 215 voting members if they are looking for really ‘clean, transparent’ set-up for the next two years.
For, a day before the polls, it is obvious from the way the two groups, which lined up against each other, are packed with controversial candidates against whom serious allegations were made and many cases are still pending.
It will be interesting to see the fate of some of those allegedly involved in misappropriation of funds (in the construction of Uppal Stadium) but are in the fray for different posts. There is also an ongoing ACB enquiry in this regard.
Campaign
BCCI vice-president N. Shivlal Yadav, who is contesting to retain his vice-presidentship in HCA, has been campaigning actively for his ‘group’ which includes incumbent secretary D. S. Chalapathi, joint-secretary S. Venkateshwaran (Indian Airlines). Though, he openly supported G. Vinod’s candidature for presidentship, he has been lobbying hard for the success of not only the above two key candidates besides many in his panel including Vijayanand (joint secretary), John Manoj, Amarnath (Galaxy), Vidyuth Jaisimha, Dharamchand Jain, for vice-president posts. Incumbent treasurer Naresh Sharma is tipped to be the favourite to retain his post from this group against Surender Agarwal.
On the other hand, former Ranji captain Dr. M. V. Sridhar is locked in a battle against seasoned campaigner D. S. Chalapathi for secretary’s post while the candidates for five vice-president’s posts include E. Venkat Reddy, P. Yadgiri (former treasurer), S. L. Venkatapathi Raju. For the two joint-secretary posts T. Seshnarayan and Purushotham Aggarwal are in the fray from this group.
There are 36 candidates for the 12 Executive Committee members posts with the senior most of them being E. Gopal.
The schedule for Sunday is that the Annual General Meeting starts around 9 a.m. at Rajiv Gandhi Stadium (Uppal) and the elections are last on the agenda and most likely to take place under the supervision of Returning Officer A. Narasimha Reddy.
