Indian cricket’s legal tussle stopping BCCI from taking on ICC on crucial issues

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI)’s legal tussle is not letting them take on International Cricket Council (ICC) despite the fact that the Indian board has huge reservations about some of the decisions that ICC has made in the recent times.

ICC has recently hired a management company McKinsey to help them with event strategy and it is believed that it’s McKinsey which has come up with the idea of holding a global event every year. While BCCI is not happy with the idea of the global events itself, they are also against the heavy pay-cheque that ICC is paying to McKinsey.

BCCI is also not in support of former Singapore Cricket Association president - Imran Hamid Khwaja taking over as the new ICC chairman from Shashank Manohar as he is from an associate nation. Despite wanting to oppose several of ICC’s proposals, BCCI has not been able to raise its voice strongly because of the lack of a long-term leadership.

While a new hierarchy is in place now under the former Indian captain Sourav Ganguly, it is not certain how long Ganguly will stay at the post. If the cooling-off period recommended by the Lodha committee applies, Ganguly will have to leave his position after 9 months, so will the secretary Jay Shah.

Both Ganguly and Shah have already served their state boards for more than two years and will have to go into the cooling off period soon. However, BCCI has challenged a couple of the Lodha Committee recommendations in the Supreme Court and the matter is sub judice.

It is understood that in the board’s governing council meeting on Sunday, the hierarchy told the legal team to 'politely inquire' in the Supreme Court as to when the matter will be heard.

Also see – PSL most runs

BCCI, England Cricket Board (ECB) and Cricket Australia (CA) are responsible for generating about 85% of the revenue of the ICC, based on which the former ICC chairman N Srinivasan had proposed a Big Three model.

Shashank Manohar - Chairman of the ICC

The Big Three model significantly increased the share of India, England, and Australia in the global revenue generated by the ICC, but it was rejected later by the ICC board, when Srinivasan’s successor Shashank Manohar took over.

BCCI and ICC have been loggerheads since the Big Three model was rejected. ICC further annoyed BCCI a couple of days back when they mentioned in a letter sent to the member boards that no member board would be awarded the hosting rights of the future global events if they failed to provide 'government guarantees'.

ICC has not yet released India’s share for the T20 World Cup 2016 which is another matter of dispute between the two bodies. The tussle is likely to continue for a while until BCCI gets its house in order and stability is brought.

---