Sports
Dalmiya elected BCCI president, Anurag secretary
Chennai, March 2
After a gap of over 10 years,
veteran cricket administrator Jagmohan Dalmiya made an uncontested
comeback as full-time president of the Board of Control for Cricket in
India (BCCI) at its 85th annual general meeting (AGM) here on Monday.
As
per BCCI rules, it was the turn of the east zone associations this year
to nominate candidates for the elections. The former International
Cricket Council (ICC) president, whose previous tenure as BCCI chief
ended in 2004, was a 'neutral' candidate from both the factions in the
board.
While one camp was led by sidelined board president N.
Srinivasan, the other camp was led by Maharashtra strongman and former
ICC boss Sharad Pawar.
Apart from the 74-year-old Dalmiya, the
other new entrant is Haryana's Anirudh Choudhary who has been appointed
the new treasurer while Himachal Pradesh's Anurag Thakur was named the
board secretary.
Anurag, a nominee from the Pawar lobby, won the
secretary post by one vote. His opponent was Baroda's Sanjay Patel,
favoured by Srinivasan.
Anirudh, belonging to the Srinivasan
camp, defeated Uttar Pradesh's Rajeev Shukla, a former BCCI vice
president, for the post of treasurer.
Jharkhand State Cricket
Association boss Amitabh Choudhary, from the Srinivasan camp, was
elected joint secretary after he edged out Pawar's ally Chetan Desai in a
tie. Interim president and chairperson Shivlal Yadav exercised his vote
in favour of the former.
Madhya Pradesh's Jyotiraditya Scindia
from the Pawar camp, lost out in the race for the central zone's vice
president to C.K. Khanna of the Delhi & Disrict Cricket Association
(DDCA).
Kerala Cricket Association's T.C. Mathew outvoted Pawar's candidate Ravi Sawant to become the vice president from West Zone.
M.L.
Nehru (North Zone), Gautam Roy (East Zone) and Ganga Raju (South Zone)
became new vice presidents of their respective zones.
Dalmiya's
elevation to the position was necessitated by Srinivasan being forced to
stay away from the election owing to a Supreme Court directive.
Srinivasan was barred by the Supreme Court from contesting the election
following the Indian Premier League (IPL) spot fixing scam. He is a
nominee of the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association (TNCA).
The court
is currently hearing the IPL spot-fixing scandal in which conflict of
interest with regards to Srinivasan's position as the BCCI president and
owner of the IPL team Chennai Super Kings has come in for sharp
criticism from the court.
Former ICC chief Pawar, who was BCCI
president from 2005-2008, was also eyeing the post, but had to backtrack
after failing to find a proposer and seconder from the East Zone.
Dalmiya
became BCCI treasurer in 1983 - the year India won the World Cup - and
later served as its secretary, before becoming ICC chief for three years
since 1997.
He took over as BCCI president in 2001 and continued to be the all-in-all in the board till his tenure ended in 2004.
Dalmiya then controlled the board by proxy for a year, with then president Ranbir Singh Mahendra being a mere puppet.
But
in 2005, Pawar registered an emphatic victory to become BCCI chief with
his team winning all the other key posts, as the Dalmiya camp suffered
an embarrassing defeat.
Months later, the BCCI lodged a police
complaint against Dalmiya for alleged misappropriation of funds related
to the 1996 World Cup in which India was a co-host.
As Dalmiya faced a police probe, the BCCI expelled him in December 2006 which also forced him to step down as CAB president.
In
mid-2007, Dalmiya was exonerated by the court, and he returned to head
the CAB in 2008, by defeating then president Prasun Mukherjee. However,
in the next few years Dalmiya seemed only a shadow of his former self,
shorn of his influence in the board.
In June, 2013, Dalmiya was
appointed BCCI's interim president after Srinivasan stepped aside till
the probe on Srinivasan's son-in-law Gurunath Meiyappan's alleged
involvement in the IPL spot-fixing scandal was completed. Srinivasan
returned to the saddle in October 2013.