BCCI raps Modi for confidentiality breach

Zeecric Bureau Mumbai: Taking Lalit Modi head on for his defiance, BCCI chief Shashank Manohar on Thursday slammed him for leaking confidential information to the media and said that the board will meet on April 26 as scheduled. “By leaking an internal communication of the cricket board to the media, Lalit Modi has breached all propriety and hence I’m forced to break my silence,” Manohar said. “The governing council meeting will go on with or without Lalit Modi,” he added. A defiant Modi had earlier made it clear that he will not attend the April 26 meeting convened apparently to decide his fate, saying he considered it "unauthorised". "If the meeting does go ahead on 26th April instead of 1st of May as I have asked it will deem to be unofficial...I do not propose to attend any unauthorised meeting," said the IPL chief. Questioning Modi’s intentions on leaking information about ownership of franchisees, Manohar said, “The original contract was signed in January 2008. Then for the first time on April 11, Modi leaks information about ownership of Kochi franchisee.” “Venugopal (co-owner of Kochi IPL) called me up and claimed that there was a breach of confidentiality clause and threatened to take legal action. Then I sent a message to Modi asking him to explain why he took such a step.” Sequencing the events as they unfolded, Manohar said, “Then on April 14 wisdom dawned on Modi that details be disclosed; to that I told him to hold on, in view of Venugopal’s mail and wanting to decide on the matter in the governing council meeting.” The BCCI chief added, “Modi replied saying that he will do accordingly.” Modi has claimed that he was told to keep quite after he asked BCCI to reveal the details of all IPL teams. Manohar, however, alleged that Modi disclosed the details as he was being continuously hounded by the media, he quipped, “Suddenly three days after he violated the norms, he wanted to disclose.” “He had marked the email to some 70 people who had nothing to do with decision-making in the IPL or the BCCI. I replied to him copying only the members of the governing council,” he pointed out. Questioning Modi’s intentions, Manohar said, “It’s fine for him to leak the mail but if it (details about ownership) was held for 2 years, 10 more days wouldn’t have made a difference.”. Yesterday evening, media reports cited a few e-mails sent by Lalit Modi to the governing Council members suggesting that he was in favour of disclosing the shareholding patterns of various IPL franchisees. “Propriety and fair play demand that we should disclose details of IPL franchises. Let’s disclose ownership details along with names of all directors once again. If everyone is okay with this we will issue the details right away. This way all doubts and aspersions being cast against IPL will be rebutted,” Modi wrote in the e-mail. Manohar also rubbished charges of impropriety by its secretary N. Srinivasan, whose India Cements owns the Chennai franchisee. He said that Srinivasan`s role in securing the franchise for Chennai Super Kings was above board. Maintaining that then BCCI president and Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar had given an okay to India Cements to bid for IPL, Manohar also slammed the IPL commissioner for not declaring to the governing council that his own relatives were part owners of IPL teams. "It is not that Mr. Srinivasan is bidding. It is India Cements company which is bidding and it is a public limited company. It is most unfair to say Mr. Srinivasan was a declared bidder. If Mr. Modi and his other relatives had a share in any of the franchises, he ought to have declared it at the meeting," the BCCI chief maintained. Referring to the meeting of the governing council of IPL scheduled April 26 in the wake of charges of financial irregularities by the league and its franchises, Manohar said there was no misconduct on the part of Srinivasan in convening it. "He (Srinivasan) is not calling the meeting as the owner of a team. Under the board constitution, the secretary is the convenor of all meetings. Even today I don`t convene a meeting, being the board president," he said. "Whether he (Srinivasan) has a conflict of interest is not an issue because Srinivasan, when the issue came up, had sought permission from Mr. Pawar who was then president of this board. Mr. Pawar granted him permission to bid."