Supreme Court Demands Answers From BCCI On Allegations Of Threat Made By CFO

The Supreme Court on Wednesday sought a response from the cricket board and its honorary treasurer Anirudh Chaudhry on allegations of a threat being made to the Board of Control for Cricket in India's (BCCI) Chief Financial Officer (CFO). Gopal Subramanium, the amicus curiae in BCCI case told the Supreme Court that the board's CFO had sent a mail in which he had said that Chaudhry had threatened him, saying that if he had been in Haryana, he would have been liquidated and an FIR would be filed against the CFO for misappropriation of funds.

Subramanium went on to tell the top court that it was a very serious allegation. The BCCI lawyer however denied this, saying that nothing like this had happened. Supreme Court directed the BCCI and Chaudhry to respond to the allegations within two weeks.

Chaudhry denied the allegations and said: "It is shocking to hear this. I will file my reply to court."

The Supreme Court will also take up the issue of formulating a new constitution for the BCCI and also to fill the two vacancies in the Committee of Administrators (CoA).

The apex court also asked CoA to file a chart, containing comments and suggestions on the draft constitution of BCCI and fixed the matter for hearing in the second week of January next year.

The apex court-appointed CoA had submitted the draft constitution before it on September 11 in a sealed cover.

In a separate development, the Competition Competition today imposed a fine of Rs 52.24 crore on cash-rich cricket board for its anti-competitive practises with respect to IPL media rights.

Meanwhile, the Cricket Association of Bihar (CAB) through its secretary Aditya Varma sought to withdraw its plea that the CoA be directed to consider granting membership to the state cricket body on the ground that such a large population cannot go unrepresented.

Varma said that CAB would now approach the CoA with its plea to recognise the state cricket body so that the youth may get chance to represent the state and the nation.

The court had on August 23 summoned BCCI office-bearers C K Khanna, Amitabh Choudhary and Aniruddh Chaudhry for allegedly coming in the way of the preparation of the draft constitution. After they appeared on October 30, the court had exempted them from appearing before it today.

The top court had said that the draft constitution should include the suggestions of the Lodha committee in its entirety so that a holistic document can be placed before it for a final decision.

The Justice Lodha panel had recommended a slew of structural reforms in BCCI which were approved by the apex court.

It had approved the Lodha panel's recommendations such as 'one state-one vote', 'one member-one post', and fixing an age-cap of 70 years on those occupying BCCI posts.

The Lodha panel was formed in January 2015 in the wake of the Justice Mukul Mudgal Committee report that called for reforms within the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI).

The Mudgal panel had gone into state of affairs of the BCCI, following the 2013 IPL betting and spot-fixing charges. The court had in its July 18 last year's verdict accepted most recommendations of the Lodha committee to reform the BCCI following charges of large-scale maladministration in the cash-rich cricket body.

(With PTI inputs)