Highlights of the Supreme Court order on January 2

It’s almost a year to the day that the Lodha Committee submitted a damning report on the governance and administrative structures of the BCCI. After a year of the board resisting the implementation of the recommendations, the Supreme Court has taken the unprecedented step of removing the BCCI president and secretary from office. The order delivered by the Supreme Court on January 2, 2017, was just as damning if not as dramatic. Here are some of its highlights:

BCCI’s unwillingness to accept recommendations established The Supreme Court observed that the BCCI remained defiant after the order was passed on July 18, while suggesting the time for objections had been when the Lodha Committee was conducting interviews to compile its report.

“Initially, as the [Lodha] Committee informed this Court, BCCI appeared to have taken the position that it was only if its Review Petition as well as Curative Petition were dismissed, that the recommendations of the Committee would be accepted,” the order on January 2 said. “This statement of BCCI at a meeting of its Working Committee held on 21 October 2016 was manifestly misconceived … By the Order of this Court dated 21 October 2016, this Court made it clear, if indeed such a clarification was at all warranted, that:

‘A party to a litigation cannot be heard to say that it would treat a judgment of this Court as not having binding effect unless the Review or Curative Petitions that it has filed are dismissed.'”

The BCCI’s use of the media to gain sympathy did not escape the court either. During the home Test series against New Zealand in September and October, Kapil Dev, Sunil Gavaskar and Ravi Shastri, who are all employed by the BCCI as commentators, had told bcci.tv that the court order was unfair in parts. Parts that the BCCI objected to.

 “The Committee has repeatedly been confronted with a barrage of unfortunate comments by BCCI – in press conferences and in correspondence with an intent that it should be led to a situation where it throws up its arms in despair and frustration,” the order noted.

No legal recourse left for BCCI The order mentioned that the BCCI’s review and curative petitions were heard and dismissed, leaving the board without further legal recourse against the Lodha Committee’s recommendations.

“This Court having furnished sufficient opportunities to BCCI to comply, it is constrained now to take recourse to coercive steps to ensure that the directions contained in its final judgment and order are not left to be a writ in sand,” the …

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