Pawar asks Modi to resign IPL boss told to shun court

Mehr Jessia Rampal and Lalit Modi at the IPL awards on Friday night. April 23: Union minister Sharad Pawar has asked Lalit Modi, the Indian Premier League (IPL) chairman and commissioner, who has become increasingly isolated, to step down. No major player was available for confirmation, but The Telegraph learns that the drama-filled script has taken on that shape. Pawar and his Nationalist Congress Party colleague Praful Patel (a Union minister, too) have been under fire in Parliament, and that was a big factor in conveying that quit-message. Till tonight, though, there was nothing to suggest that Modi was actually about to heed Pawar’s directive/advice. One also understands that Pawar, a former president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and the next head of the International Cricket Council, met successor Shashank Manohar in Mumbai late this evening. Apparently, their meeting lasted a couple of hours but details weren’t available. They’d met earlier in the week, as well, in New Delhi. Manohar may well have insisted that Modi had to go. Making it hotter for Modi was Rajeev Shukla, a member of the IPL’s governing council. “Wisdom should prevail upon him,” the Congress MP, who has been “briefing” the government on cricketing issues, said. Sachin, who released a book on Sourav Ganguly, did not attend the IPL awards. (PTI) While Modi isn’t leaving the crease, even after multiple index fingers have gone up, a well-placed source pointed out that he’d been “persuaded” not to move court. “Modi has been told by well-wishers that matters concerning the BCCI must be resolved within and not through the filing of suits.... He seems to have been convinced of the need to settle everything inside the parent body,” the source explained. The IPL is, of course, a hugely successful property of the BCCI. Modi’s call for a postponement of the IPL’s emergent governing council meeting, on Monday, has already been turned down by the BCCI. That he continues to hold on to his position, despite Parliament being rocked once more, is adding to the anger within. (According to an agency report, Modi has again sought “five days” to prepare his defence. It quoted him as saying: “I have worked for you for five years.... Give me just five days to prepare answers to all the questions....”) That was reflected in the boycott of the IPL’s inaugural awards, tonight. Indeed, barring Modi himself, not a single BCCI official was spotted. Can Modi risk such a no-show on Sunday, during the closing ceremony and the prize distribution function of IPL III? Forget those with the ruling group in the BCCI, nobody from the Jagmohan Dalmiya-headed Cricket Association of Bengal went to Mumbai either. “With so much turmoil going on, it makes sense for Dalmiya to keep his cards close to his chest.... There’s no need to expose himself,” remarked a close watcher of the goings-on in the BCCI. Meanwhile, a former BCCI president, A.C. Muthiah, has moved the Supreme Court citing a clash of interests and “challenging” the parent body’s decision to allow secretary Narayanswamy Srinivasan to be an IPL team (Chennai Super Kings) owner. The supreme irony is that Srinivasan cut his teeth as an administrator when Muthiah called the shots in the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association. In recent years, however, they’ve been at daggers drawn. But, then, five years ago Manohar and Modi had come together to end Dalmiya’s innings in the BCCI. Clearly, such is its set-up that it doesn’t take long for friends to turn foes.

Source :Telegraph