The BCCI has called its emergent Special General Meeting (SGM) on December 11, which means the meeting will take place after the ICC workshop that will be held on December 7-8, in Singapore to discuss the minutiae of the new Future Tours Programme (FTP) for 2019 to 2023. The Supreme Court-appointed Committee of Administrators (CoA) had asked the BCCI to convene the meeting before the ICC workshop because the FTP was one of the three important agendas, but the BCCI has failed to meet that date. The agenda for the SGM will now be the settlement of the dispute concerning the Kochi Tuskers Kerala franchise and the revocation of the suspension of Rajasthan Cricket Association.
“The BCCI has convened a Special General Meeting (SGM) on Dec. 11, 2017 in New Delhi at 12.30 PM under the instruction of Mr. CK Khanna, Acting President and as per the directions from the Committee of Administrators,” a board release on Tuesday said, without expanding on the agenda.
In the absence of a general body debate over the FTP, despite the request from the CoA on November 15 through an email to Khanna, the committee gave its nod to the board’s plan of the FTP designed by CEO Rahul Johri. At the workshop, the Full Member countries will chalk out a week-by-week plan for the FTP, extending from post-2019 World Cup till 2023. Apart from the global events, the FTP will cover the Test and ODI Leagues, which start in the next two years. It is understood that there has been resistance among the BCCI office bearers and the general body against rushing through with the FTP without “time and documents to study and deliberate on the item”.
As per the BCCI’s existing constitution, the president can call for the SGM with a 21-day notice period. However, he also has the power to reduce the notice period to 10 days, which the CoA had asked Khanna to do.
The important topic for the SGM now remains the litigation involving the Kochi Tuskers. The BCCI needs to decide whether, and how much, it should pay the owners of the franchise, whose agreement was terminated in 2011, two seasons after it came into existence. The BCCI had also encashed the bank guarantee of INR 153.34 crores at the time of termination, which the owners contested in the court. The court asked the matter to be settled via arbitration.
In 2016 the Kochi owners won the arbitration case, which said that the board would not only refund the bank guarantee amount encashed by them, but also pay an additional INR 384.83 crore towards compensation for termination of the franchise. Subsequently, the BCCI’s attempts to resolve the issue amicably failed as the Kochi owners wanted compensation upwards of INR 1000 crore. During the SGM in May, Amitabh Choudhury, BCCI secretary, told the members that the BCCI might negotiate a settlement soon. In October, the IPL governing council resolved that the BCCI was left with no choice but pay the compensation. The CoA now awaits the members’ collective call on the subject.
Source: ESPN Crickinfo