SC bats for Gavaskar as BCCI chief

The Supreme Court shook up the world of cricket on Thursd­ay as it suggested making former Indian Test captain Sunil Gavaskar the interim president of the BCCI in place of the embattled N Srinivasan.

The court also considered disallowing Srinivasan’s team, the Chennai Super Kings, and the Rajasthan Royals from playing in the seventh Indian Premier League (IPL7) that starts on April 16 in the UAE.

“We will have to think hard and pass some orders in the interest of cricket,” said a bench of Justices A K Patnaik and F M I Kalifullah, which is scheduled to pass an interim order on Friday.

“We will say Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals are not going to be allowed. We will pass orders tomorrow,” the bench said.

Senior advocate Aryama Sundaram, appearing for the BCCI, contended that suspending the teams would disturb the tournament’s schedule and as per bylaws, a franchisee agreement could not be rescinded just like that.

The court, however, reminded the board about the suspension of Gurunath Meiyappan and Raj Kundra, connected with Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals, respectively. The court also mooted that all employees of Srinivasan-run India Cements, which owns the Chennai Super Kings, should be kept out of the BCCI set-up.

“All officials of the BCCI who have any connection with India Cements must go,” the bench said, inviting reply from the board and Srinivasan on its proposals.

The bench, which had earlier warned of passing the verdict on the fate of Srinivasan if he did not step down, fixed the matter for interim order on Friday. At the start of the hearing, the BCCI submitted a note in which Srinivsan expressed his willingness to step aside and not function as the board chief till the probe into the IPL corruption case is concluded. A time-bound probe was sought, with only weeks to go before IPL7.

After hearing arguments on behalf of the Cricket Association of Bihar, the bench said that for the time being it wanted to replace Srinivasan with an eminent former cricketer and would lay down conditions for the IPL 7 in view of findings by the Justice Mukul Mudgal panel.

The court told the BCCI to ask Gavaskar if he was willing to take up the assignment.