India threatened to break away from ICC, says BCCI official

Proposed move to revamp ICC, giving greater power and a greater share of revenues to India, England and Australia, proved controversial.

N Srinivasan, Giles Clarke and James Sutherland are in charge of the India, England and Australia cricket boards respectively.

NEW DELHI // India forced a revamp of the International Cricket Council (ICC) by threatening the world body with forming a breakaway faction, according to the secretary of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).

“We were criticised and a lot of them did not agree but we told them that if India did not get its due and importance, we might be forced to form a second ICC,” Sanjay Patel said at a function in the southern Indian city of Hyderabad on Saturday night.

The revamp of the ICC gives greater power and a greater share of revenues to India, England and Australia.

“England and Australia agreed and after that it was decided that from June 27 onwards the new structure will come into place. I would like to state that all 10 full members have signed the resolution,” Patel said.

“India would play a leading role in the ICC and the reasons are well known. India is more or less responsible for 68 to 72 per cent of the ICC’s gross revenue but unfortunately so far we were getting three to four per cent of it. We worked out that India should get 24 per cent, which works out to approximately US$700-800 million [Dh2.58-2.94 billion],” Patel said.

N Srinivasan, the suspended BCCI chief, was cleared by the Supreme Court to take over as the chairman of the ICC later this month despite an ongoing investigation of his potential role in corruption in the Indian Premier League.

Patel said that since the court had not restrained Srinivasan from running the world body, India will take a leading role in the ICC.

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