Looks like it’ll be Kotla, after all

After all, the India-South Africa fourth Test appears set to be held, as scheduled, at the Ferozeshah Kotla ground here from December 3.

Thursday turned out to be a day of hectic parleys with the Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal forming a three-member committee to look into the allegations of corruption against the Delhi and Districts Cricket Association (DDCA) and the two officials of the DDCA meeting members of this panel.

It may be recalled that the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) had set DDCA a deadline — November 17 — to confirm whether it was in a position to hold the Test match. Pune is the standby venue.

“We are going to meet the members (Ms. Punya Salila Srivastava, Secretary Education, Mr. Chetan B. Sanghi, Principal Secretary Urban Development, Rahul Mehra, Senior Standing Counsel of the Delhi Govt.) again on Friday. Going by the positive approach of the members today, we are hopeful of holding the match. After all, we need just four days. We have done it so often in the past,” said a confident Ravinder Manchanda, the DDCA treasurer.

Earlier, addressing a press conference, former India captain Bishan Singh Bedi reiterated that “the condition prevailing in the DDCA is not terribly conducive to organise a Test match which is an international event.” Others who addressed the gathering were former Delhi captain Akash Lal, India stumper Surender Khanna and National Capital Territory (NCT) Cricket Association’s Sameer Bahadur.

Bedi, along with a few more former cricketers, met the Delhi Chief Minister two days ago and apprised him of the state of affairs in the DDCA. “We were asked by Arvindji that if the Test match does not happen here then who will be at a loss and we said that the people of Delhi will be at a loss, because Ferozeshah Kotla (ground) belongs to the people of the Capital not to a particular individual,” he said.

To substantiate his point that the BCCI should take over the affairs of DDCA, Bedi said, “I don't want Delhi to be deprived of a Test but this has come from the BCCI that DDCA needs to procure these permissions before November 17. The BCCI should be wide awake to the fact that they are running Rajasthan Cricket Association (RCA). So why can’t they appoint their own committee to run the affairs of DDCA?”

Cricket slum

Akash Lal asked, “Is the DDCA worthy of holding a Test match? It is nothing but a cricket slum not worthy of staging even a Ranji Trophy match.”