Vinod Rai Believes CoA Performed Their Job Exceptionally In The Last 2-3 Years

The CoA was appointed by the Supreme Court in October 2017 to oversee the operations of the board and make sure the member units implemented the reforms suggested by the Lodha committee. From a four-member committee, the Vinod Rai-led CoA’s strength decreased to two after Vikram Limaye and Ramachandra Guha quit from their posts over the last years.

Despite being reduced to two, they have done brilliantly for the Indian cricket, thus, not letting any serious requirement to bring elections for BCCI. However, Vinod Rai tried to bring elections, as it was a CoA job to hold them. But, with 85 applications being present, they decided to give it a break to fresh applications as was ordered by the Supreme Court.

Our Job is to conduct Elections:

Further, he questioned whether there is a black mark in the Indian cricket since CoA taking the responsibility. He showed the performance graph of India’s men and women teams, who have done brilliantly in the last couple of years. Further, he added that cricketers are pretty happy to do their job for the team without any other options.

“Our job is to conduct elections and we are unable to conduct elections because there are 85 IAs [Interim Applications] pending before the Supreme Court filed by those very people who if the elections are conducted will get unseated. They don’t want to be unseated,” Vinod Rai quoted to India Today.

“It’s a very happy situation to be in, that there are two, now three, individuals they can throw stones at them and can have no accountability. Tell me one thing, has cricket in India suffered over the last two years? Men’s cricket, women’s cricket the teams are doing exceedingly well. You ask any cricketer today if his or her interests are in any way subjected to anything else,” he added.

Vinod Rai hits out critics:

Vinod Rai went on to question the critic masters asking the real reason behind the elections. Further, he highlighted the fact that there is no need to run cricket in India, it has a huge fan base and people believes it is a religion in the country.

“Why did the Supreme Court have to step into it [cricket administration] if the people who were holding the positions that they were holding in the BCCI doing their jobs properly? It was not because a Vinod Rai wanted to get into it or a Diana wanted to get into it. It was because there was a not only a perceived but a demonstrated fallacy in the functioning of the BCCI,” Rai said.

India is a democratic cricketing body:

He also showed his optimistic side on the Supreme Court. Vinod Rai felt that the court knows how to play the game if there are any wrong allegations were taken to them. Rai was pretty comical in his statement to the criticisers.

“And today, India is a democracy, cricket is not a passion, it’s a religion. People who are concerned about the way it was being managed, they approached the court. Well, the Supreme Court is as good a batsman as anybody else. If the ball is thrown at them, they can’t say ‘it’s a wide ball and I can’t bat’.

I came as a nightwatchman – Vinod Rai

The chairman furtherly revealed that he was asked to manage CoA for a few days but it carried to 25 months for now. He was pretty proud of his work to the Indian cricket and indirectly took a dig at his criticizers.

“Yes, there are far more important things that the Supreme Court has to attend to. Well, when I was appointed, I said I have come in as a nightwatchman. Unfortunately, the nightwatchman has had to stay for about 25 months, much against our wishes. We don’t want to run cricket, it’s a democratic body, it should be entrusted to be a democratic body.”