BCCI uploads new constitution, Mumbai no longer Full Member

The Supreme Court-constituted Committee of Administrators finalised and uploaded a new constitution for the Board of Control for Cricket in India on Saturday, in line with the reforms suggested by the Justice Lodha Committee.

As per the new constitution, 30 associations were deemed to be the controlling bodies for cricket in their respective states and were considered to be Full Members with voting rights. Maharashtra and Gujarat were included in that list which meant that the Mumbai Cricket Association and the Saurashtra Cricket Association, which were Full Members earlier, were relegated to Associate membership.

However, the constitution clarified that it was not permanent.

“In States with multiple Existing Members, the full membership shall rotate annually among such Existing Members such that only one of them will exercise the rights and privileges of a Full Member at any given point of time. The rotation shall be as per the policy framed by the BCCI,” said the constitution.

The list also includes states like Bihar, Telangana, Arunachal Pradesh, Manipur and Meghalaya which were not considered Full Members earlier.

The new constitution also lays down some of the benchmarks of the Lodha ruling. BCCI office bearers cannot be over the age of the 70 or be a Minister or government servant. They also cannot hold any post in a sports athletic association or federation apart from cricket.

The term of office for each office-bearer will be three years and no office-bearer can have more than three terms. There will remain a three-year cooling-off period between each term while an office bearer who has completed nine years in office, either at the BCCI or any state association, will be ineligible.

A COA member clarified to The Indian Express that they had only prepared a constitution approved by the court and the next step would be to figure out how to implement it.

Responding to the removal of Mumbai as a Full Member, the unnamed official said, “We are not at liberty to change the court order. This is the court order, which has approved the Lodha Committee recommendations, one of which is one-state-one-vote. The Committee has the mandate of implementing the court order. It has been put in place for that.”