BCCI General Manager RP Shah resigns; says no pressure from COA

What’s the story?

RP Shah, a General Manager at the Board of Control for Cricket in India, has resigned from his post stating age as the reason for resignation. But some BCCI officials believe that this big decision could be because of the newly appointed Committee of Administrators (COA) who are looking deeply into each and every function of the Board.

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“Yes, I have resigned from my post. The reason is that I am 61 years old. I had taken the decision back in October. I live in Pune and I was finding it hard to regularly travel to Mumbai. There was no pressure or query from COA. I shared a good rapport with CEO Rahul Johri and the CFO Santhosh Ragnekar. Rahul wanted me to continue but I requested him to relieve me,” Shah said.

In case you didn’t know...

In the year 2016, General Manager of Communications and Co-ordination, Amrit Mathur retired after reaching the age of retirement. Mathur stated that he retired according to his employment conditions.

During Mathur’s retirement, there were questions raised about why Shah and the Game Development employee Ratnakar Shetty were still continuing even beyond the retirement age of 60.

The heart of the matter

RP Shah’s name had come up in the year 2016 when the retired ombudsman of BCCI AP Shah had received accusations of conflict of interest against RP Shah. The allegations stated that he was the director of the constructions group, BG Shirke Constructions, and the top boss of the group was the ex-secretary of BCCI, Ajay Shirke.

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BG Shirke also had a close relationship with the Mumbai Cricket Association. Shah announced his resignation on 18^th of February.

Parallels from history

The new COA has put the old BCCI hierarchy under pressure and several officials in various posts have quietly resigned. Nishant Arora, the Indian team's media manager, resigned earlier this month. He was said to be close to former BCCI President Anurag Thakur and was said to have leaked team information to Thakur.

Sportskeeda’s Take

The conflict of interest has caused some uneasiness in the committee. With the two GMs resigning, the board should replace them with new and efficient members who do not have any conflict of interest and are morally sound.