MAPUSA A tug-of-war between the present and former managing committee of Goa Cricket Association (GCA) has cost cricket hard in the State in the last couple of years.
The arrest of three key executive members of GCA has opened a can of worms, indicating that all was not well with the administration much to the detriment of the game.
An indoor practice wicket built at Duler-Mapusa has been lying idle and practically abandoned by the GCA for more than two years now. The practice wicket was built in the property belonging to the former GCA president Dayanand Narvekar around seven years back. The facility to provide indoor net practice to cricketers was built at a cost of around Rs 40 lakh. It has three pitches, with nets and fluorescent lights for night practice.
“The Duler infrastructure was the first indoor facility in Goa, followed by MCC in Margao and Mashem in Canacona. All cricketing activities at these places have been stopped soon after Narvekar was booted out,” said Prasad Fatarpekar, former GCA secretary.
“The present managing committee under Chetan Desai ignored these sites soon after taking charge,” Fatarpekar added. Sources disclosed that Narvekar had granted permission to GCA to build the facility in his property in Duler for free. But the taint of corruption and personal gains were levelled against the former GCA president too.
“Narvekar may have allowed the GCA to build the facility in his property but the Association was paying rent to him every month to use the facility,” said a source in GCA. “The former president offered only a small part of the land to the GCA, but he used GCA funds to develop and build a fence all round his property,” the source revealed further.
Attempts to contact the former GCA president Dayanand Narvekar were futile as calls to him went unanswered. Fatarpekar, however was quick to dispel the allegation against Narvekar, saying that no rent was paid to the former president for the facility. The former GCA secretary further disclosed that the present committee even ignored to conduct any cricket activities at the BITS Pilani ground that was leased to GCA. “BITS Pilani had signed MoU leasing its ground to GCA for a period of 30 years. We had spent over Rs 2 crore to build four wickets, a pavilion and other facilities on the ground. For more than a year, GCA has failed to conduct any activity there,” Fatarpekar disclosed. It may be recalled that in 2012 a two-member committee comprising Chetan Desai (GCA president in custody) and Anil Lavandis while investigating into financial and administrative malpractices of the Goa Cricket Association had unearthed several malpractices including the use of GCA staff by the former president, use of cars by him and his family members and by some of the executive committee members. With the arrest of the present executive GCA members, it appears the clock has turned full circle.
