JOIN US Senior BCCI official Prof Ratnakar Shetty, who was on Tuesday banned for five years by the Mumbai Cricket Association, slammed the decision saying it was a personal vendetta and vowed to challenge it legally.
The seasoned administrator was banned for alleging that some MCA office-bearers could have sold the tickets for the T20 International between India and Pakistan played at Ahmedabad last December in the black market. “Yes. He has been banned for five years from representing any club under MCA’s jurisdiction. It does not prevent him from coming to MCA’s premises,” MCA president Ravi Savant said. “We have not prevented him from earning his bread and butter,” added Savant.
Shetty lambasted the descision. “I have raised an issue at the AGM of the Association pertaining to the misuse of MCA funds and have done nothing wrong,” he said.
“This is a personal vendatta by people who want to make sure that I do not contest the next elections and also because their ego was hurt that the two anti club resolutions proposed by the managing committee had to be taken back by the Chairman after he sensed the mood of the house after I raised the issue on behalf of the members,” he said. “I will fight this kind of undemocratic decisions both within the association and legally,” Shetty added.
The ban is effective till June 2, 2018 and Shetty is to challenge it in a court of law. Shetty is the BCCI’s General Manager, Game Development, and the Board’s office is in the same building as the MCA at the Wankhede Stadium. Savant further said that the ban has been imposed for his allegations against some MCA office-bearers, regarding a December 28 T20 match, which have been found untrue after the association conducted an inquiry.
The decision to ban Shetty, who has been associated with the MCA for several years and served it in the capacity of committee member, secretary, treasurer and vice president, was taken on May 14 by the managing committee.
The committee also gave Shetty additional time to listen to the video recording of the meeting and his allegations and then revert to the MCA, which he did a few days ago. The letter dated June 2 informing the imposition of the ban was delivered to him on the day.
Saying that his allegations had caused embarrassment to the MCA’s office-bearers, the letter stated that the allegations levelled by Shetty “were found to be baseless on the perusal of documents available in the MCA records as well as subsequent confirmations of concerned members of the sister Association, who requisitioned and accepted the tickets for that particular match and paid for the said tickets.”
The letter further stated that Shetty had been given a chance to furnish proof about his allegations with show cause notice and he had replied to it “in a very evasive manner” and did not furnish any proof.