NEW DELHI: The friction between the Supreme Court-appointed Committee of Administrators (CoA) and the
BCCI office-bearers has come to the fore again. This time it’s over
Kevin Pietersen being selected to deliver the
MAK Pataudi lecture
after
Kumar Sangakkara was unavailable.
In a letter to the CoA and BCCI officials, acting secretary Amitabh Choudhary has alleged that the three office-bearers were kept in the dark while selecting a foreigner to deliver the speech.
“When the matter was discussed with me at Bangalore a couple of days ago (May 8), I had suggested we also look for probable speakers amongst distinguished cricketers of yesteryears such as Nari Contractor, Chandu Borde, Erapalli Prasanna and Abbas Ali Baig. These cricketers have even the distinction of having played alongside Tiger Pataudi and if any of them agrees it could provide the much needed perspective on how cricket has evolved from those years of challenge,” the letter said.
Amitabh added in the letter: “Unfortunately, when the proposal came there was no mention of any of these past cricketers. As I understand Tiger Memorial Lecture is not an elocution contest and reasonable communication skills are all that we should look for. It is meant to bring to the fore the evolution of the game, what it meant to play for the country in the old days, the hardships of the time, challenges of the future and the like. If that be the case, certainly once every few years an iconic cricketer of yore should find a place as the keynote speaker in the Memorial Lecture.”
TOI understands that the office-bearers are not happy with Pietersen’s selection because the cricketer's attitude towards the game has always been under the scanner. “He was suspended a few times by ECB for disciplinary issues. He has allegations of not being loyal to his team when he was text messaging the South African players during a series. How can you pick someone like that to talk about peace in cricket,” sources close to the development told TOI.
Choudhary is specifically unhappy with the fact despite he him making his idea known to BCCI GM (cricket operations) Saba Karim, the options had only one Indian in it—Sourav Ganguly. That's why Choudhary has enquired about the process as he questioned the rush from the CoA since the lecture is due to happen in September.
Following are the questions put out by Choudhary:
=>How was the list of four arrived at without adverting to the conversation on the very subject on May 8 at Bangalore?
=>Why was their relevance to the Pataudi lecture per se not explained?
=>Once the Chairman had authorised only exploring Mr Sangakkara’s availability was it not incumbent upon the person authorised to report his availability on the trail before proceeding further in view of Chairman’s stated position of being open to other names?
=>On the basis of which authorisation was the jump made to Mr Pieterson’s name without seeking authorisation do so?