NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Monday asked cricket board president N Srinivasan to prove that there was no conflict of interest despite him wearing multiple hats as BCCI chief, managing director of India Cements which owned Chennai Super Kings and as chairman of IPL governing council.
“We will have to examine the documents to find out who did what at the relevant time. We will have to lift the veil and see,” a bench of Justices T S Thakur and F M I Kalifulla said as senior advocate Kapil Sibal began presenting Srinivasan’s defence against a host of allegations by petitioner Cricket Association of Bihar.
Sibal took the court’s fresh poser by its horns and said, “Please lift the veil and see. Nothing will be found against Srinivasan. The terms and reference of the Mudgal inquiry committee focused on the IPL betting scam and there was no mention of inquiry into anything relating to conflict of interest on Srinivasan’s part.
“The Mudgal inquiry committee did not find anything against Srinivasan. But the petitioner association has one point agenda to remove Srinivasan. The petitioner had given up all its pleas except probe into IPL scam. And now all the pleas which were given up earlier are being revived through back door.”
But the bench said, “Whether the Mudgal committee report gave a finding on conflict of interest or not, the moot point is either there is conflict of interest or there is not. That is the moot question for adjudication. You will get the fullest opportunity to show us your documents to prove that there was no conflict of interest.”
Sibal said there was this bogey of ‘cover-up’ raised against Srinivasan relating to his son-in-law Gurunath Meiyappan. “Immediately after Meiyappan’s arrest, it was Srinivasan who was seeking speedy prosecution. The meeting of the BCCI governing council on suggestion of Arun Jaitley had decided to constitute a committee comprising retired judges of Madras High Court overruling Srinivasan,” Sibal said.
“So, Srinivasan was not involved in the constitution of the committee and he had on his own decided to keep away from the affairs of the BCCI till the Mudgal panel inquiry proceedings were over. How can conflict of interest allegations be leveled against him,” Sibal asked.
He requested the court to give him a full day’s hearing to “disabuse the mind of the court from the sustained outrageous allegations made by the petitioner”.
CAB counsel Nalini Chidambaram claimed that Mudgal committee had commented adversely on the multiple hats worn by Srinivasan and expressed apprehension that it could give rise to conflict of interest.
Sibal said then IPL commissioner Lalit Modi had requested India Cements to own an IPL franchise and before doing so, India Cements had written to then BCCI president Sharad Pawar asking whether Srinivasan’s presence in India Cements and BCCI would create ‘conflict of interest’.
In the initial difficult days for IPL, there were not many takers for franchises, and the board took the decision that a cricket administrator would not be barred from owning a franchise and changed the rule that prohibited it, he said.
If the pre-2008 rule was applied now, then even Sunil Gavaskar, Ravi Shastri, Sourav Ganguly, Anil Kumble, Lalchand Rajput, Venkatesh Prasad, Krishnamachari Srikkanth and Brijesh Patel would face unfounded conflict of interest charge like Srinivasan, Sibal said.
CAB argued that the IPL franchise CSK came into being in 2007 whereas the amendment to the rule, which had barred sports administrators from getting involved in BCCI’s commercial ventures, came into existence only in 2008. This means CSK was disqualified in 2007 itself, the petitioner said. Arguments will continue on December 8.
TOI | Dec 2, 2014
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