Contrary to what N. Srinivasan claimed at the media briefing on Sunday, the BCCI wasn’t unanimous on the decision to let him continue but it was the lack of a big leader to lead the revolt and collect a crowd of fence-sitters in the BCCI. Sensing a move to discuss the probable ouster of Srinivasan, several board officials skipped the lavish IPL dinner bash hosted by Jagmohan Dalmiya and instead decided to adopt a wait and watch policy on the outcome. A few minutes into the informal meeting at the gathering, attended by 17 state unit members, it was clear that everyone wanted Srinivasan to resign but none was ready to bell the cat. Dalmiya, who was prodded by several members to lead the jury against Srinivasan, politely declined citing ill-health. According to sources, it was left to Arun Jaitley and Rajeev Shukla to persuade Srinivasan to resign on moral grounds. Another area of concern was the choice of alternate candidate if Srinivasan resigns; while Shivlal Yadav was the candidate to take over as per BCCI constitution, none was eager to project him in this hour of crisis.
According to sources, Jaitley was also reluctant himself to take over keeping in mind the credibility of the IPL and mess around it and the general elections around the corner.
If the BCCI decides on asking Shashank Manohar, who is not currently attached with the functioning, to step in, then it will put a negative impact on both Shukla and Jaitley’s abilities to lead the board in the future.
|
Vijay Pithadia, Fellow IETE, PhD https://www.srkinstitute.in/DirectorMsg ORCID ID: 0009-0003-8222-4306 M: +91 989 842 2655 https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=F2-1SQ8AAAAJ