From outcast to unopposed BCCI chief, Jagmohan Dalmiya rises from the east

Jagmohan Dalmiya is back with a vengeance, the plan was in place.

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Jagmohan Dalmiya seems all set to take back the BCCI throne. (Source: Express Photo by Partha Paul)

When Jagmohan Dalmiya attended the February 8 working committee meeting in Chennai, he looked old and not in the best of health. According to a member who attended the meeting, the CAB president was a silent spectator of the proceedings. His son Abhishek took notes for him. About three weeks down the line, the 74-year-old appears to be a completely changed man. “There’s a spring in his step and he looks to be in the pink of health,” said Goa Cricket Association president Dr Shekhar Salkar.

If you go by his colleagues in the CAB, Dalmiya had been quietly preparing for this moment. “The day the Supreme Court barred N Srinivasan from contesting the BCCI elections, Dalmiya started to plan his next move, knowing full well that his reputation and credibility might make him a consensus candidate. He was closely following the developments,” said a member from his state association.

Still, Dalmiya’s re-emergence in the Indian cricket board is as stunning as it was unexpected. After losing power in the BCCI in 2005 — his candidate Ranbir Singh Mahendra lost to Sharad Pawar in a bitterly-fought election — the septuagenarian cricket administrator from Alipore, Kolkata, appeared to gradually fade away. A two-month stint as interim president in the wake of IPL spot-fixing controversy in 2013 was considered to be an aberration. Dalmiya is now set to return in a full-time capacity after he announced his candidature for the presidential post on Sunday.

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The 85th AGM of the BCCI in Chennai on Monday will see no contest for the top post as Dalmiya is the only candidate to file his nomination. He will be elected unopposed with support from both the Srinivasan and Pawar factions. The turnaround to a flagging career, according to sources, has been made possible because Srinivasan had no other option.

Pawar reportedly was toying with the idea of throwing his weight behind BJP MP and Himachal Pradesh Cricket Association president Anurag Thakur for the top post. But without adequate support from the East Zone, he opted to back Dalmiya. Incidentally, this is East Zone’s turn to nominate the president.

“Even after the January 22 Supreme Court verdict on IPL corruption, Srinivasan had been harbouring hopes of becoming the president for a second term. He might have thought that selling off his stakes in the Chennai Super Kings and filing an affidavit before the court in this regard would make him eligible. But as the apex court made it clear last Friday that he couldn’t contest, the outgoing BCCI president had to search for a replacement. The problem with the likes of Sanjay Patel, Anirudh Chaudhary and Amitabh Choudhary was that they didn’t have the wholehearted backing of the East Zone. Dalmiya’s name has been universally accepted,” said the source.

IPL chairman and Orissa Cricket Association president Ranjib Biswal concurred. “Dalmiya emerged as a consensus candidate because all four East Zone associations wanted him to become the president,” he told The Indian Express. Make it six, with Dalmiya himself leading the CAB and mother-henning Kolkata based National Cricket Club. He had ruled the ICC from 1997 to 2000 before becoming the BCCI president in 2001. The stage is set for a grand return.

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