The Indian Supreme Court-appointed Lodha panel "recommended on Monday barring ministers and government officials from holding office in the Board of Control for Cricket in India and legalising betting in sweeping measures to clean up the scandal-ridden sports body," according to the HINDUSTAN TIMES. The panel headed by justice RM Lodha "was appointed by the apex court last year in the wake of a sport-fixing scandal in Indian Premier League, the biggest crisis to hit the cash-rich sports body in the country." The panel "submitted a 159-page report on Monday to the Supreme Court for ratification." Among the "drastic suggestions was the one to legalise betting, which the panel felt would help curb corruption in the game and recommended that except for players and officials, people should be allowed to place bets on registered websites." The panel "also suggested shake-up of the BCCI from top to bottom as part of its mandate to go into the functioning of the cricket body and address issues of corruption and conflict of interest that threatened the fair name of the game" (HINDUSTAN TIMES, 1/4). FIRST POST reported each office bearer "will have a tenure of three years and no office bearer can hold the office for more than three terms with the rider that there will be a cooling off after each term -- in other words no office bearer can hold two terms consecutively to account for a 'cooling period.'" The "other big recommendation comes in the form bringing BCCI under the purview of Right to Information Act -- an issue that has long been a bone of contention with the cricket body." The committee proposed that the IPL and the BCCI "should have separate governing bodies, along with a host of other recommendations for the governance of BCCI to the Supreme Court" (FIRST POST, 1/4). IANS reported according to the report, the IPL governing body "should be nine members with the secretary and the treasurer of the BCCI as its ex-officio members." Two other members of the IPL governing council "should be nominated or elected by the full members." Two "should be the nominees of franchises, one be a representative of the players association (that is to be formed), and one a nominee of the Comptroller and Auditor General of India." The panel "stressed that one representation for one state is a fair idea as was the suggestion that each state should have only one association as a full member of the BCCI and have a right to vote" (IANS, 1/4).
BCCI DECISION: The PTI reported the BCCI's three-member Disciplinary Committee, headed by President Shashank Manohar, "will take a decision on the fate of tainted cricketers, Ajit Chandila and Hiken Shah, on Tuesday." The two players had met the committee members in person in Mumbai to answer questions put to them on Dec. 24 "before the three-man panel deferred taking a decision by giving them time till January 4 to file a written response to the charges of spot-fixing against them" (PTI, 1/4).
