Vinod Rai praises Supreme Court decision on mandatory cooling-off period for BCCI officials

The BCCI and Supreme Court-appointed CoA have been at loggerheads ever since the Lodha reforms were passed last year. Hence, the recent ruling by the Supreme Court will be music to the ears of the CoA as they made the cooling-off period mandatory for office bearers in the Indian governing body.

The original Lodha Committee reforms put forth only one term of three years before mandatory cooling off, but today’s change allowed office-bearers to contest two consecutive terms before the mandatory cooling off. The new judgement meant that current acting secretary Amitabh Chaudhary and acting treasurer Anirudh Chaudhry will be eligible to contest for a second term.

‘‘This is an excellent order by the Honourable Court. I have absolutely no problem with office-bearers having two consecutive terms. Even I had originally wanted a six-year term before cooling off period but couldn’t get consensus,’‘ Rai told PTI sources.

Another COA member and one of India’s greatest female cricketers Diana Edulji also welcomed the latest order by the SC.

“We are happy with the judgement. We were appointed by the Supreme Court in the first place to oversee reforms. Now that SC has modified its order, we will have to see that it is implemented properly. I hope everybody will comply and cricket will move on.

“We did not have anything personal (against any BCCI official). We were nominated by the SC to do a job and our focus has always been on that,” she added.

But Rai revealed that another positive outcome of today’s ruling was the timeline set by the SC for the adoption of the approved BCCI constitution. This would in turn also pave the way for the Board’s elections provided there is 100 per cent compliance by the state associations. The state bodies were issued a warning by the Apex COurt to either comply or face the consequences.

‘‘Now we finally have a roadmap in place which will lead to adoption of the new constitution and subsequently elections. Now there is a time-line in place,’‘ Rai said.