Opinion One hat only

IN its first set of sweeping changes, the Shashank Manohar-led BCCI regime has ensured that no stakeholder ends up donning more than one hat. Ravi Shastri, Roger Binny and Anil Kumble all had to forego important posts within the board. If Shastri is no longer a member of the IPL governing council, Binny, whose son Stuart is a member of the Test and ODI squads, and Kumble, who is Mumbai Indians chief mentor, have been replaced as national selector and chairman of the technical committee respectively. The biggest loser is N. Srinivasan, who lost his ICC chairman post, and is now reduced virtually to a mere “cricket enthusiast”.

The ultimate ouster of Indian cricket’s most unrelenting official, though, was only one of the many positive steps, as the new regime set about ridding the board of the conflict of interest albatross. The appointment of A.P. Shah, a retired chief justice of the Delhi High Court, as the board’s first-ever ombudsman, is as crucial a move. While during the Srinivasan era the solution for the myriad of issues facing the board was dealt with by appointing committees represented by “inside men”, the BCCI has finally taken a bold step by handing an outsider unprecedented powers to clean up its mess.

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Could the stringent clampdown on “conflict of interest” mean the BCCI will be robbed of the experiences of its former greats, given that it’s only natural that a cricketer post-retirement takes up a role bearing commercial interests, be it as a commentator, a coach or in a cricket academy? Probably not. For, even the Supreme Court has observed that the roles of players who render their services as commentators or mentors cannot be compared to the charges against those like Srinivasan. As Justice T.S. Thakur famously observed, their roles were more like Sanjay of the Mahabharata, completely dispassionate, having no stake in which team wins or loses.