The final act in the saga of legal conflict between the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and Supreme Court-appointed Lodha Committee will be played out next week as the Apex court has deferred the pronouncement of the final order in the matter to October 17. Whatever the judgement, the outcome of the long-drawn battle doesn't augur well for Indian cricket.
On its part, the BCCI has shown blatant disregard in following the deadlines of the court. The Board is aggrieved because it feels that Supreme Court's intervention in some areas of administration is unwarranted and many in the BCCI consider it as judicial overreach. Even some of prominent voices in Indian cricket -- like Sunil Gavaskar and Kapil Dev -- have questioned the wisdom behind some of the recommendations like one state, one vote. The cricket board seems to have some genuine issues but in choosing defiance over humility, it has put its interests in peril. If the top court decides to appoint independent administrators, superseding the BCCI top brass, it will prove to be a huge blow to the cricket body.
Given its stature and the in-your-face attitude, the BCCI has always found itself on the wrong side of things in the Apex court. So, often we hear statements like "fall in line or we'll fix you" from top judges of the Supreme Court flung towards the board -- something similar to what a father would tell his errant child. But the BCCI is no child. It's the world's richest cricket board and the country's most efficient sports body among all the national sports federations.
So given the messy affairs of most of the other national federations in India, it's surprising that not one of these bodies other than the BCCI face the wrath of the Supreme Court. To clean up Indian sport, the top court's intervention is needed to fix inefficient federations in sports like hockey, boxing, basketball and football. There might be a lot wrong with Indian cricket, and the way the BCCI has administered it down the years, but it’s certainly not broken like other sports are.
India has come up with a grand plan of winning 50 medals at the 2024 Olympics. So far, India has only won 28 medals in the 24 Olympic Games that it has participated in since 1900. This year, our athletes managed to win just two medals at the Rio games.
To fix the situation, NITI Aayog has released a 20-point agenda that it says will help achieve the target in 2024 Games. But it will all come to a nought if we don't fix our sports federations. Some judicial activism and Supreme Court intervention can certainly help in achieving it.
