NEW DELHI // A committee appointed by India’s top court has called for politicians to distance themselves from the administration of cricket, as it proposed a drastic renovation of the scandal-ridden body that governs the sport in the country.
The three-member committee, headed by retired chief justice RM Lodha, was scathing in its assessment of the health of the sport, and the integrity of the board of control for cricket in India (BCCI).
The committee’s report, submitted to the supreme court on Monday, also recommended the legalisation of sports betting, to bring to the surface the vast nexus of bookmakers, agents and players that currently operate beneath Indian cricket.
“At a time when the nation’s highest court has been compelled to find that the game has fallen into disrepute, only extraordinary steps will bring it back from this chasm,” the 159-page report said.
“The fact that forces from politics and business see cricket administration as a stepping stone to recognition and publicity is irrelevant to the cricket fan, until he realises, as many embittered souls recently have, that the game is not really being played on the cricket pitch.”
The supreme court appointed the committee last year, following a betting and match-fixing scandal in the domestic Indian Premier League (IPL) tournament in 2013. Several IPL cricketers as well as team owners and administrators were found to be guilty of leaking team information to bookmakers, betting upon the results of games, and underperforming in return for payments.
Last July, even as it was working on its final report, Mr Lodha’s committee recommended an immediate, two-year suspension of two IPL teams – the Chennai Super Kings and the Rajasthan Royals. Members of the companies that owned these franchises – including the son-in-law of N Srinivasan, head of India Cements, which owned the Chennai Super Kings – were declared ineligible to participate in any cricketing activities for five years. Three players from the Rajasthan Royals were also suspended for match-fixing.
The new report focuses on making the BCCI – the wealthiest body in Indian sport, and the most corrupt – more transparent and accountable.
Mr Lodha’s proposals include banning government ministers or civil servants from holding official positions within the BCCI – a trend that gathered steam in the early 1980s, and reached its peak with Sharad Pawar, who, between 2005 and 2008, was simultaneously BCCI president and India’s agriculture minister.
Cricket in India offers politicians both "money power and soft power", TR Vivek, co-author of the 2009 book IPL: Cricket and Commerce — An Inside Story, told The National.
The IPL, Mr Vivek pointed out, was a “billion-dollar business” and BCCI officials were well-placed to earn vast amounts of illicit money by awarding contracts to favoured parties in return for kickbacks.
“And because of its popularity, cricket gives you enormous soft power,” Mr Vivek said. “Last year, states were being given the chance to stage IPL matches in the manner of a political dole-out. When Chhattisgarh got an IPL match, [chief minister] Raman Singh painted the town red, as IF it was some sort of personal political triumph.”
Mr Lodha’s committee has also recommended that the BCCI be made subject to India’s Right to Information Act. This would enable citizens to file requests for information on the body and make it more transparent.
The BCCI has resisted this demand in the past, claiming that it is an autonomous institution rather than a government body, and is thus not bound by the act.
The hierarchy of the BCCI may also need to be restructured. The committee has advised that the body be run by a governing panel, rather than by a single president. Officers on the panel would serve short, three-year terms, with no one allowed to serve two consecutive terms.
The report envisions a new association of present and former cricketers having a greater role in the BCCI, with an unspecified number of places on the governing panel always reserved for representatives from this association.
A BCCI official, who asked not to be named, said that the report’s recommendations would not prove popular among cricket administrators.
“Politicians won’t leave the benefits of this game so easily, and they will want to cling to their positions for as long as possible,” he said. “The report also says that no one older than 70 years can occupy a post. But the officials who are older than 70 won’t just leave. They’ll fight this.”
The report’s recommendations are not binding upon the BCCI. “Our legal committee will look at the report and make its own recommendations, and then the BCCI can decide whether it wants to act upon them or not,” the official said.
But Mr Vivek pointed out that it was within the supreme court’s powers to make some or all of the report’s recommendations binding.
“There will be enormous public pressure, particularly since the IPL has lost all its credibility,” he said. “The time to brazen it out is gone. That’s not an option any more.”
ssubramanian@thenational.ae
