BCCI wary of inviting Supreme Court’s wrath, adjourns SGM

The Indian cricket Board’s Special General Meeting (SGM) was adjourned on Sunday after the members decided not to ‘annoy’ the Supreme Court ahead of a hearing. The SGM has been postponed to Wednesday.

The Committee of Administrators (CoA), appointed by the Apex court to monitor the implementation of the Lodha panel recommendations, has sought the court’s direction on who are eligible to represent the BCCI in ICC meetings. The court will hear the matter on Monday.

A source at the meeting venue, where former BCCI chief, N Srinivasan, was also present, said some members were not happy the Board top brass wanted Srinivasan to represent it at this month’s ICC meeting without a clarification from the court.

“They did not want to annoy the court, so it was decided to adjourn the meeting,” said the source. The members had held hectic parleys on Saturday night.

“The meeting was adjourned as SC is hearing the matter tomorrow. Since there are legal implications, Amitabh Chaudhary, the joint secretary, announced an adjournment,” former Saurashtra unit head, Niranjan Shah, told reporters.

CK Khanna, the acting Board president, said, “It was agreed that we should wait for the SC order on the issue.” He, however, denied there were difference of opinion among the members.

The main point in the meeting’s agenda was the nomination of a BCCI representative to the ICC meeting. Some senior Board members want Srinivasan, the previous ICC president, to attend the meeting as it involved the reduction of India’s share in global cricket revenues.

The CoA though had said Srinivasan did not meet any criteria --tenure or age --- as laid down by the Lodha panel report.

However, Board members had been contesting that the constraints and criteria applied to only office-bearers and not to representatives. “We believe that we can send anyone as a representative as the recommendations’ reference is only for office-bearers,” said a senior official.