N Srinivasan and N Ramachandran - a dynasty of power, or of corruption?

The world of Indian sports is no stranger to corruption and controversies, to say the least. But in what is a departure from the norm, the corruption business seems to be following a pecking order where, evidently, the senior and most talented ‘controversial’ personalities are somehow given more responsibilities and with it more power. Let’s have a look at two such personalities who head two of India’s biggest sporting authorities – the brothers N Srinivasan and N Ramachandran.

N Srinivasan – the man who can withstand a thousand setbacks

BCCI president N Srinivasan

N Srinivasan, the current president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and owner of India Cements, has an array of pending cases against his name. And despite media and national outrage demanding his resignation for his alleged involvement in the IPL spot-fixing controversy in 2013, he continues to remain in power of the richest cricket board in the world. Not just that, Srinivasan was recently appointed as the Chairman of the International Cricket Council (ICC) too.

After the start of the IPL in 2008, the Clause 6.2.4 in the BCCI regulation that stated “no administrator of BCCI could have had, directly or indirectly, any commercial interest in the matches or events conducted by the cricket board”, was amended so that BCCI members could own stakes in the IPL franchises. This wasn’t just a coincidence, as Srinivasan later went on to become the owner of Chennai Super Kings. The case against N. Srinivasan on the grounds of conflict of interest is still pending in the Supreme Court of India.

In 2013, BCCI president’s son-in-law, Gurunath Meiyappan, was arrested by the Mumbai police for involvement in major-league betting and trading inside information to bookies. On 10 February 2014, a report submitted by the retired High Court Chief Justice Mukul Mudgal-led committee indicted Meiyappan of illegal betting and passing on sensitive match-related information to bookies during IPL 2013. The 170-page report also stated that Srinivasan’s company, Indian Cements, was liable for Meiyappan’s actions and that the Chennai Super Kings franchise was in violation of the franchise agreement, which may result in the termination of the IPL franchise.

Srinivasan, president of the sport that is a religion in our country, is also one of the accused in the Jaganmohan Reddy corruption case. The CBI is of the opinion that Srinivasan’s company, India Cements, allegedly invested Rs. 140 crore into Jaganmohan’s businesses in return for the benefits it received from the YSR Reddy-led Congress government in Andhra Pradesh between 2004 and 2009. On February 12, 2014, Srinivasan appeared before a special CBI court in the alleged quid-pro-quo investments case, but refused to comment on it to the media.

N Ramachandran – the younger sibling in the brotherhood of controversy

IOA president N Ramachandran

Moving on, N Ramachandran, the younger brother of the BCCI supremo N Srinivasan, became the president of the IOA a week ago by a unanimous vote in the IOA polls despite having three cases pending against his name. In this case, that actually IS a coincidence though, as the cases haven’t come up for hearing yet; if he had already been chargesheeted in any of them, he would have been barred from contesting the elections as they were conducted under the terms of the Olympic charter this time. Ramachandran was formerly the general secretary of the Tamil Nadu Squash & Racquet Federation of India and is the present chief of the World Squash Federation.

There are some serious cases of manipulation, forgery and misleading coming up against the newly elected IOA president. The first case, which is up for hearing in the Delhi High Court on 21st February, is for his involvement in misleading the Government of India to get a National Award, the Rashtriya Khel Protsahan Purashkar from the President of India, in 2011. According to the case, he fraudulently led the Sports Ministry to believe that he fulfilled one or more of the 16 clauses needed to get the award.

The second case is of alleged conflict of interest – that he has violated the IOC’s Code of Ethics. While giving an undertaking to the World Squash Federation in 2012, he reportedly claimed to have been just a patron of the Squash and Racquet Federation of India. But in reality, he was, and still is, the president of SRFI. He also did not disclose that he was the former general secretary of the Tamil Nadu Squash & Racquet Federation of India. The IOC code of conduct prohibits any candidate to contest the election if he/she has any conflict of interest in the conduct of the federation or association.

Ramachandran also has a case of forgery under his belt; it is alleged that he committed forgery of documents which prevented Deepika Pallikal, India’s top squash player, from partaking in a tournament. The SRFI, due to their supposed personal dislike for Deepika Pallikal, misguided the sports ministry before the Supreme Court of India in 2008 to keep her out of the contingent list.

Srinivasan and Ramachandran – dynasty of power, or of corruption?

It is hard to believe, or rather hard to digest, that the two brothers, N Srinivasan and N Ramachandran, now carry the future of the already tarnished image of Indian sports. Corruption and dynastic politics have been spilling into every part of our society, and now the sports field too seems to have become a victim of that evil.

If both Srinivasan and Ramachandran are cleared in all the cases pending against them, then this will be a moot point. But the question needs to be asked: what if they are not acquitted? What if they are found guilty of any of the multitude of misdeeds that they have been accused of? How comfortable would a patron of Indian sports be in the knowledge that at one point of time, no matter how brief, two corrupt individuals from the same family practically had complete control of the two most important sporting bodies in the country?

Perhaps it’s just a coincidence that the two brothers currently occupy the two biggest sporting positions in the country. Perhaps we are making a big deal out of nothing, and Srinivasan and Ramachandran are actually saints in the guise of sports administrators.

But just in case that doesn’t turn out to be true, we as well start writing the obituary of Indian sports.