BCCI shouldn’t be in power brokers’ hands: Bombay HC

Observing that the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) should be in “the hands of sportspersons and sports lovers”, the Bombay High Court today, while disposing of a public interest litigation (PIL), said the board “should not become a tool for musclemen, merchants or media barons and power-brokers”.

The PIL was filed against the election of Lalit Modi as a vice-president of the BCCI by a 71-year-old cricket-lover, Chandravardhan Parekh. Parekh contended that Modi couldn’t continue as vice-president as he was accused of “an offence involving moral turpitude”, having being found in possession of drugs, kidnapping and assault. (See box).

Asking the state to take note of the allegations made in the petition, the court said that the state cannot remain a “silent spectator to the power game” and would have to ultimately “use its power and authority to check the mismanagement and mal-administration” in the BCCI.

The court, however, did not wish to go into the aspect of whether or not Modi could be disqualified on that ground alone as there is a civil writ petition and arbitration proceedings filed in the Supreme Court and that the matter is sub-judice.

Declaring the PIL “maintainable”, the division bench of Chief Justice Swatanter Kumar and Justice S C Dharmadhikari said the board, which is in charge of enormous funds and is conferred with “drastic powers” to control, monitor, manage and administer the game, should have officers who are “persons of calibre and character” so as to not “shake the faith and trust of the cricket loving public and common man”.

The court said: “The board should not become a tool for musclemen, merchants or media barons and power-brokers”.

The court directed the BCCI to take care that “those involved in criminal cases not just relating to illegal drugs but other serious charges have no place in the administration”.

The High Court said the purity and sanctity of an electoral process should be preserved at all costs and “ought not to be fought on party lines... Elections ought to be conducted in the same spirit in which the game of cricket is played.”