Muthiah can raise cricket board's issue, apex court told

Published>Thu, Sep 09 10 08:57 PM

New Delhi, Sep 9 (IANS) The Supreme Court was Thursday told that former Board of Control for Cricket in India president A.C. Muthiah under the cricket body's rules was its administrator and entitled to move the court to check any irregularity in its functioning.

The court was told this in the course of the hearing of petitions moved by Muthiah seeking the removal of the BCCI secretary N. Srinivasan allegedly involved in a conflict of interest.

Muthiah's plea before the Madras High Court was declined on the grounds of his locus standi in the matter.

Senior counsel Abhishek Manu Singhvi appearing for Muthiah told the apex court bench of Justice J.M. Panchal and Justice Gyan Sudha Misra that Srinivasan was involved in a conflict of interest.

He said Srinivasan was the secretary of the BCCI and also the vice-chairman and the managing director of India Cement company - the owner of IPL team Chennai Super Kings.

The court was told that this was specifically barred under the BCCI rules until they were amended to rescue Srinivasan from conflict of interest situation.

Referring to the manner in which the rules were watered down to mitigate the conflict of interest, Singhvi said that this was recommended by a committee that was mandated only to frame rules to prevent doping, racial discrimination and use of abusive language in the game.

The mandate of the committee remained 'untouched and unaddressed', he said.

The senior counsel told the court that his client has even challenged the amendment to the BCCI rules which were affected after Muthiah wrote to the board about the untenable position of Srinivasan.

Seeking directions of the court, Singhvi said: 'We have demanded an inquiry against Srinivasan and till that was completed he should stay away from the BCCI.'

When Singhvi told the court that Srinivasan should not continue with the BCCI even for a day, Justice Panchal said that if the apex court were to decide this question then what would be left for the trial court to do.

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