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It is important for Indian cricket that the election to the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), scheduled for October 22, takes place without any delay.
The Supreme Court-appointed Committee of Administrators (CoA) is threatening to destroy the edifice of the BCCI, which had once risen to become the richest and the most powerful body in world cricket.
The governance of the cricket board is now in tatters with the CoA, which was supposed to clean up Indian cricket, making a mess of things with their indecision and ad-hocism.
It is public knowledge that the two members of the CoA, chairman Vinod Rai and co-member Diana Edulji cannot see eye-to-eye, thus making a mockery of the objective of the Supreme Court.
Despite all the ills within the board, the functioning of the BCCI continued because of a time-tested structure that was created years ago. Of course, one cannot deny the fact that the BCCI did slip into the hands of a few who misused their powers and attempted to destroy the democratic norms that were followed in the functioning of this organisation.
The CoA has now been at the helm for nearly two years, but they have failed miserably in bringing any reform. Ramachandra Guha, one of the four initial members of CoA had resigned stating ‘differences of opinion’ and Rai and Eduljee do not mutually agree on anything. The erstwhile elected members of the BCCI, who were removed from power by the Supreme Court, must be having a chuckle at the BCCI’s state of affairs.
The manner in which they handled the Hardik Pandya and K.L. Rahul incident, following their controversial remarks on Karan Johar’s chat show, and the BCCI’s CEO Rahul Johri getting exonerated of sexual harassment charges amidst Eduljee protesting vehemently — all reveal the CoA’s height of incompetence.
Even the recent Virat Kohli-Rohit Sharma rift issue was so unprofessionally handled by the panel.
A strong BCCI administrative body would ensure that players maintain discipline and even superstars in the Indian team do not dare to do anything reckless.
The elected former BCCI representatives were well aware in the art of swelling the BCCI coffers by getting major shares from the International Cricket Council (ICC) by influencing other member nations. This money could have been streamlined for Indian cricket’s development.
The different groups that existed in the BCCI have now realised that it’s time to fight unitedly and have hence chosen the shrewd former BCCI President N. Srinivasan to lead the way. Assuming that the members have learned from their past mistakes, which ultimately led to the formation of the CoA, the election must now happen to regain Indian cricket’s power and glory.
