New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Thursday reserved its verdict on the BCCI petition opposing the Justice Lodha panel recommendations to streamline the working of the Board. Even as senior counsel for the board, K.K. Venugopal, strongly opposed the recommendations barring Ministers / government servants from holding office, a bench of Chief Justice T.S. Thakur and Ibrahim Kalifulla made it clear that there was no bar on politicians holding any position in the BCCI as long as he was not holding any other office. As justice Kalifulla is retiring later this month, the bench decided to hear separately BJP MP Subramanain Swamy’s appeal against suspension of Chennai Super Kings on July 25.
At the outset, the CJI made it clear to the counsel “we are not interfering with the functions of BCCI. The recommendations are not interfering with your cricketing right. We are not interfering in the selection of the team, which fast bowler you should select or how you decide on the selection of a player. But since the selection of the team is for India, what we say is there must be some accountability.
Earlier, the counsel said there cannot be a judicial review in the functioning of the BCCI as long it does not violate the provisions of the Tamil Nadu Societies Registration Act under which the BCCI is registered. On the suggestion to restrict the term of office bearers, counsel said such a bar would also hamper continuity of meritorious and deserving administrators and impact the development of the game.
He said ban on ministers, government servants holding honorary posts will be in violation of freedom of association under Article 19(1) c of the Constitution. Also there is no warrant for an age cap of 70 years for a person being chosen in a democratic manner as an office bearer in the BCCI. Merely because he is 70 does not mean he ceases to function efficiently. The right to admit or exclude members, granting voting rights to a member can’t be decided by the court. If the court were to interfere in sporting bodies then it should interfere in all the 64 sporting bodies in the country,” he added.
