After Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra And Haryana, Five More Affiliated Units Barred From Attending BCCI AGM

The Supreme Court constituted Committee of Administrators (CoA) on Thursday debarred five more state units from attending the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) Annual General Meeting (AGM) in Mumbai on October 23 due to non-compliance in their amended constitutions. (More Cricket News)

Out of the 38 affiliated units, now 30 will attend. Yesterday, the CoA debarred Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra and Haryana. The picture on who will be attending the AGM became clear after BCCI electoral officer N Gopalaswami released the final electoral roll. The Indian cricket board added the names of Manipur, Uttar Pradesh, Railways, Services and Association of Indian Universities in the list.

Read: Former BCCI Lawyer Questions CoA's Decision To Debar Affiliated Units

But unlike state associations, the three government institutions were barred as they failed to form a players' association.

According to the release, former India captain Sourav Ganguly is the nominated representative from Cricket Association of Bengal, a body which he is heading. Mohammad Azharuddin, another former India captain, will be representing the Hyderabad Cricket Association.

Rajat Sharma (Delhi), Jay Shah (Saurashtra), Arun Singh Dhumal (Himachal Pradesh) and Brijesh Patel (Karnataka) are among the other nominated representatives.

Most of the barred state unites are likely to challenge the decision in court and that could put the AGM in jeopardy.

Earlier in the day, BCCI's former principal legal advisor Usha Nath Banerjee questioned the CoA's decision to debar the affiliated units, and termed it "utterly arbitrary and wrong".

Tamil Nadu, which is under the control of former BCCI president N Srinivasan, was supposed to be represented by its secretary SS Ramasaamy while Haryana, under the rule of outgoing treasurer Anirudh Chaudhry, was set to be represented by Mrinal Ojha.

The TNCA, which recently elected Srinivasan's daughter Rupa Gurunath, had 21 violations in their amended Constitution, including non-compliance in age cap (over 70 years), tenure of cooling off period being a few major ones.

Even after they complied with a few later on, they didn't adhere to the major reforms and had taken a tough stand that it is not in CoA's authority to debar any state unit as their job is to merely file status report on compliance. Haryana and Maharashtra also toed the same line.