BCCI: An invincible institution consisting of indispensable administrators write Kirti Azad

Like a cantankerous child whose toy has been forcibly taken away, BCCI has been throwing tantrums and almost questioning the power of the Supreme Court to interfere with the governance of what it claims is a wholly private society. See who is complaining?

Haryana Cricket Association (HCA), which was taken over during the emergency by Haryana strongman Bansi Lal, has seen his son Ranbir Singh Mahendra and now his grandson Anirudh Chaudhry control it. HCA is a family-owned company where no cricketer can even become a member, let alone an office bearer. Who will forget the meeting in 1994 when the legendary Kapil Dev and several cricketers were almost manhandled and thrown out by Mahendra's henchmen in Chandigarh? 

Is it any wonder that each of the 21 districts in Haryana gets a measly Rs 1 lakh a year when BCCI gives Rs 35 crore as subvention money?

Like in DDCA, where hundreds of crores have been swindled and defalcated, practically no state association can properly account for hundreds of crores that are given to them over the last decade. Most of them do not even have a proper stadium despite gobbling up tons of money. 

Interestingly, the senior counsel of HCA, who passionately spoke about the contribution of Bansi Lal family since 1975 and how their experience is necessary did not state that he himself is a product of mutual benefit society – he represented Haryana and now his son is captaining Haryana U-16 – their performances are not even worth mentioning.
Saurashtra Cricket Association has been run by Niranjan Shah and according to his counsel, used to have a stationery shop till 42 years ago, when he got into SCA.

Claiming credit for producing Salim Durrani, Ravindra  Jadeja and Cheteshwar Pujara, he wants the proposed cap of 70 years and nine-year embargo to be dropped. The current status is fine. Get 15 states/votes and control all power, money and positions in states and BCCI. The politicians can make a mockery of the election process. Just swing three central votes – Universities, Services and Railways – and add the captive 11 votes from Kolkata, Gujarat, Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh.

The state associations can teach even the politicians how to rig elections. Membership is rigged and elections are manipulated. In Delhi, proxy voting is thoroughly abused with multiple members even residing at the residences of office bearers. Twenty four office bearers control nearly 4,200 out of 4,300 proxies. Maharashtra, Baroda, Punjab and now, HCA's counsel have added a new dimension to their brazenness by claiming that Lodha Committee's recommendations were only recommendations – nothing more. 

The executive functionaries are all honourary office-bearers with most of the top state cricket associations being run by a politician, bureaucrat or a heavyweight industrialist, petty shopkeepers, tailors, drapers, stationary shop owners.

Politicians in BCCI 

The most contentious issue seems to be the committee's recommendations on politicians who occupy top positions in the BCCI. Already resentful of any such move, a lot of members in the BCCI have already started saying it is tough to ensure that only ex-players can prove to be good administrators. 

In fact, they claim that the politicians are required to get clearances from local government and having politicians at the helm helps them to get clearances easily. We have already seen how a file for demolition was kept hanging in various courts for 19 years and how an unauthorised block in Ferozeshah Kotla was not touched despite Delhi High Court's orders.
Institutional integrity is a term that is alien to BCCI. Politicians seeking glamour under the sun and without any knowledge of cricket administration have destroyed the concept of accountability in BCCI. The very fact that the Supreme Court has had to step in shows the rot in BCCI's and units' functioning. 

Having seen all state associations clamouring for relaxing the age and tenure criteria, the Chief Justice of India rightly quipped: "Are all these guys indispensable and that there is no one else to step into their shoes? The cemeteries the world over are full of people who were once indispensable". It is time that these guys moved over. 

(Kirti Azad is a former India all-rounder and Member of Parliament)