ICC gets ‘altered’ contracts, calls it revolt

The longest-running soap in cricketing history has taken another turn. The ICC today said it had received ‘altered’ signed contrac...

The longest-running soap in cricketing history has taken another turn. The ICC today said it had received ‘altered’ signed contracts from the Indian cricketers and, while not elaborating, said it was a ‘revolt’.

Though a final decision on the Indian stance will be taken by the ICC later this week, going by its aggressive posture it seems the contracts dispute might well reach the Lausanne-based Court of Arbitration for Sports (CAS).

For the ICC-BCCI feud to become cricket’s first case in the Swiss-based sports court, the international body has to play ball with Dalmiya. According to former Chief Justice of India R S Pathak, currently the president of the court’s Olympic and Commonwealth Games division, the CAS can take up the case only if there is an arbitration clause in the contract signed between the two parties and both agree to approach it for a mediation.

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In other words, if one of the parties doesn’t wish to approach the CAS, the case falls flat.

And, according to the ICC’s corporate affairs manager Brendan McClements, the ‘‘big decision’’ on whether or not to approach CAS will be made when the ICC Cricket World Cup Contracts Committee meets later this week ‘‘to react to the Indian players’ revolt and the altered contracts’’.

Justice Pathak spelled out for The Indian Express the procedure involved in approaching the high-profile independent legal body, set up by former International Olympic Committee president Juan Samaranch to solve sports disputes.

Once they decide to approach the CAS, the two parties will each have to select one arbitrator from among 200 legal experts across the globe to hear their side of the story. A presiding arbitrator appointed by the CAS will complete the three-member panel to hear the dispute.

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Both parties can be represented by their lawyers at the hearing; the CAS will deliver its verdict after deliberations. The timeframe will be worked out depending on the urgency of the dispute. ‘‘In cases of extreme urgency, the procedure is fast tracked and the verdict expedited. At events like the Olympics, a final verdict is given within 24 hours or at times even less than that,’’ he said.

There are two categories of cases, one of which appears to fit the contracts dispute perfectly. Known as ‘Ordinary Arbitration Proceedings’, it deals with sponsorship contracts and those for granting television rights to a sports event, contracts between and athlete and his or her manager and questions linked to third-party liability.