BCCI clout would disappear if Lodha reforms are put in place – Manohar

Former BCCI president Shashank Manohar has said the board is happy to implement 75% of the recommendations made by the Lodha committee. There are five recommendations Manohar is against and he elaborated on them at a media briefing in Mumbai on Saturday afternoon.

“I respect Justice Lodha very much because he was one of the finest judges this country has produced. He is a very honest, upright person,” he said. “The report, which he has given regarding the functioning of the board, 75% of the recommendations are very good and out of that most of them are already implemented. However, I have my own reservations with regard to few recommendations, which according to me are not in the interests of this board.”

Advertisements between overs

Lodha committee: All existing contracts for Tests & ODI matches be revised and new ones ensure that only breaks taken by both teams for drinks, lunch and tea will permit the broadcast to be interrupted with advertisement.”

Manohar: That would destroy the financial structure of this board. The recommendation says there should not be any advertisements except during lunch and tea breaks. But the board does not sell time. The board sells the live feed. And during the lunch and tea breaks, they go back to studios and there are no advertisements.

The BCCI has appointed an agency to monitor the telecast [and ensure] all the six balls are shown. There is a penalty clause in the contract itself which says termination of the contract can be inflicted in case all six balls are not shown.

The board generates its revenue through advertisements. Today, the broadcaster pays about INR 43 crores per game – ODI or a T20I or a Test match. The board revenue would come down drastically, to about 15% of what it is getting now. The broadcaster would then fetch money only from the home connections. There is an expenditure for the broadcaster for uplinking, downlinking and distributing the signals.

When the Justice Lodha committee came out, Star India, the official broadcaster for BCCI, had written a letter to me saying that they would like to renegotiate the contract because they said it is impossible to pay INR 43 crore if advertisements can’t be shown. If the financial structure collapses, according to me, the board would be relegated to the ’80s when there was no money. The board has started a lot of schemes for the benefit and welfare of the players, all those schemes would have to be shut down.

If the board’s income today is INR 2000 crore, it will come down to INR 400 crore. Out of that, if we have to pay 30% tax, we are left with INR 300 crore. For organising matches and tours, the expenditure incurred by the board is about INR 90 to 100 crore. We distribute to the players about INR 125 crore. Even to maintain the infrastructure at the association level, it requires a minimum of INR 2 to 3 crore per year. Then there are matches which are played at Under-15, Under-17, Under-19, Under-23 [levels]. About 900-1000 games are played in every state association. It requires expenditure. If the board’s income comes down to INR 400 crore all these things would not be possible.

Today the board has a clout internationally. That clout would disappear. So it would not be wise to stop the advertisements during games.

One State – One Member – One Vote

Lodha committee: It is not proper for only one or two states to have multiple members when all other states have single memberships (in fact, while many states have no representation).

Manohar: It is also not a correct recommendation. It is easy to say the North-Eastern states …

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