New Delhi: The Supreme Court today said that it will hear on October 10 plea of Cricket Association of Bihar seeking directions to declare the postponement of Annual General Meeting (AGM) as illegal.
The plea was mentioned before a bench headed by Justice T S Thakur which is also seized of the main matter in which Justice Mukul Mudgal Committee is probing the IPL betting and spot-fixing scandal.
The BCCI, in an informal gathering of its members on September 7, had decided to convene a Working Committee meet on September 26.
The plea, filed by Aditya Verma, secretary of the Cricket Association of Bihar, claimed that N Srinivasan got members of BCCI to meet informally at Chennai on September 7, and himself attended the meeting as representative of Tamilnadu Cricket Association and got them to agree that the AGM of the Board will not be held in September, 2014.
“BCCI is being run as a private fiefdom of Srinivasan and all the members of the BCCI act with herd mentality and seem to be acting at his behest to promote his interest and ensure that he has a total monopoly over the BCCI...,” the plea said. It, further said that even after Srinivasan was restrained by apex court from acting as the President of BCCI, “he has by proxy continued to act as virtually its President”.
The plea contended that Srinivasan holds tremendous influence over other members of the Board, who are dependent on the patronage of Board's office bearers. Claiming that the strategy behind postponing AGM was to wait for the Justice Mudgal Report so that if Srinivasan was exonerated then he can contest for the President's post. “Hence the postponement of the AGM is undemocratic and not in the interest of BCCI. BCCI should be directed to call the AGM forthwith to uphold democratic principles,” it added.
The apex court, on September 1, had rejected Srinivasan's plea for reinstatement as BCCI President and asked the panel to complete it's investigation within two months and also allowed it to file interim report against him or any other office bearer who are under its scrutiny. The court had posted the case for further hearing on November two but allowed the committee to file interim report on any individual if it wishes.
Justice Mudgal committee, which is conducting probe against Srinivasan and 12 prominent players in the scandal, had on August 29 filed its interim report in a sealed cover before the Supreme Court.
The apex court had on May 16 given the task to conduct probe against 69-year-old Srinivasan and 12 players to Justice Mudgal panel and asked it to file its report by end of August. It had rejected BCCI's proposal to conduct the probe through its own panel.
The Mudgal committee had earlier investigated the scandal and submitted in a sealed envelope its initial report in which names of Srinivasan and 12 cricketers were mentioned.
Besides Justice Mudgal, the panel has AdditionalSolicitor General L Nageshwar Rao and advocate Nilay Dutta as members.
A group of investigators headed by senior IPS officer B B Mishra has assisted the Mudgal Committee which was given the power to probe, search and seize relevant documents and record evidence.
