'Ranji-playing units deserve recognition'

Baroda CA executive member Bharat Patel admits cricket needed Lodha reforms, but wants voting rights for teams in the national championship

Justice RMâu00c2u0080u00c2u0088Lodha, who has put the Indian cricket board administrators on the back foot

The Justice RM Lodha panel's recommendations of one-state-one-vote to the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) seem to be the only serious bone of contention in implementing all its recommendations in toto at the moment. With time running out, members of various state associations are trying hard to send the message across that the panel needs to do some serious rethinking where this recommendation is concerned.'

Talking to mid-day, ex chairman and MD of P&G and executive member of Baroda Cricket Association (BCA) Bharat Patel, said: "What Justice Lodha has done to Indian cricket is what Donald J Trump has done to the Republican Party… blow it up. To some extent there is much that deserved blowing up – the cronyism, corruption and conflict of interest. But a bomb doesn't have the luxury of only blowing up which is bad— it blows up which is good as well."

Fifa-like scam possible
Patel said that one-state-one-vote will lead to widespread corruption and bogus voting which will lead to a FIFA-like scenario where a country like Qatar had to be awarded World Cup hosting rights despite being fully aware that playing football at 44 degree centigrade will be torturous to the players. "OSOV will certainly bring FIFA's one country, one vote-like corruption. Recent arrests of FIFA officials and representatives from the Caribbean and Africa for taking bribes for votes are a good example.

Bharat Patel

"Why not follow the International Cricket Council (ICC) example where voting members are Test-playing countries? If a state team qualifies to play Ranji Trophy, only then give them voting rights. Let that be the benchmark as we all know that the Ranji Trophy and not the IPL is the bedrock of Indian cricket," said Patel, who himself was a member of the Indian Premier League (IPL) governing council when Chirayu Amin was chairman.

Respect great units
"Let us look at the scenario if one-state-one-vote is implemented. Mumbai, Baroda and Saurashtra will have no voting rights. The contribution of these three centres to Indian cricket, right from the days of Vijay Merchant, Vijay Hazare, Chandu Borde, Ajit Wadekar, Sunil Gavaskar, Dilip Vengsarkar, Ravi Shastri and Sachin Tendulkar matters for nothing in the pursuit of the odd one-state-one-vote principle. East on the other hand – the zone with the greatest interest in football in the country – which will have 11 votes has nothing much to show except Sourav Ganguly and only one - West Bengal - has won the Ranji Trophy. Mumbai and Baroda, with no voting rights would have won 50 out of the 82 Ranji titles so far. Does this look right?" asked Patel.

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