Cricket made a state board to regulate the game, but not for the recovery process: Supreme Court
New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Monday refused to entertain the petition of former IPL president Lalit Modi, which was to impose a fine of Rs 10 crore for FEMA violations during the second season of IPL in South Africa in 2009 for a direction for the control of cricket in India.In May 2018, the Assistant Authority held BCCI and its office bearrs responsible for the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) and imposed a fine of Rs 82.7 crore on BCCI, Rs 10 crore on Lalit Modi, Rs 10 crore, N Srinivasan at Rs 11.5 crore, Travancore (now merged with SBI).Looking for Modi, advocate Vikas Mehta told a bench of Justice PS Narasimha and R Mahadevan that according to the rules and regulations of the association’s memorandum, the BCCI was to condemn the carrier of his office against all the damage and expenses he did during the discharge of his official duties.He said that the BCCI has compensated Srinivasan and Pandov against the punishment imposed by the Assistant Authority in May 2018, but has not yet responded to their request for similar treatment.Modi, in his petition, challenged the decision not to entertain his writ petition, saying, “There is no basis for the BCCI to separate the petitioner’s case from Pandov and Srinivasan.” HC cost Rs 1 lakh on Modi.
The bench said that Bombay HC had properly rejected Modi’s writ petition as it is not maintained as the BCCI is not a state when it comes for civil proceedings, including the recovery of money. A bench, led by Justice Narasimha, said, “BCCI is a state regarding regulating and operating the game of cricket in India and hence the writ petition can be made only when it is related to these two aspects of cricket.”It said that Modi will have the option to go to civil courts to recover money from BCCI. Modi’s lawyer withdrew the petition to contact civil courts.Following alleged financial irregularities during the IPL second season operations in South Africa in collaboration with Cricket South Africa (CSA), BCCI initially suspended Modi as IPL chairperson and then expelled from BCCI in 2010.
