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The heat is on

Four days ahead of the working committee meeting of the Board of Control for Cricket in India, sparks have started flying, with some senior board officials and members turning the heat on its former president I S Bindra following his criticism of the functioning of the body.

BCCI vice-president Kamal Morarka and joint secretary Jyoti Bajpai turned up at a press conference along with members of some of the constituents of the board and termed Bindra's allegations as ''borne out of frustration due to his dwindling support base'' in the BCCI.

''The heat unleashed by Bindra is more in the media and the ministry than in the BCCI,'' Morarka said.

Morarka charged Bindra, who is also the president of Punjab Cricket Association, with trying to browbeat the constituents and alleged that during the 1997 annual general body meeting in Chennai, he (Bindra) used his official powers to ''manipulate'' the elections in favour of his nominee against Raj Singh Dungarpur.

Morarka said, ''I have never seen such naked display of political, bureaucratic and money power ... . Fax facilities of Punjab Urban Development Authority were used to send messages to a television company abroad.'' He, however, refused to specify or divulge the contents of the messages.

''No zone can ever claim to dominate the board which is run in a democratic way wherein majority opinion is respected ,'' he said.

BCCI joint secretary Jyoti Bajpai went a step further and alleged that during the annual general body meeting in Jaipur last year ''some people were offered money''. He also, however, shied away from elaborating before a persistent group of mediapersons.

Since the match-fixing controversy unfolded last month, Bindra has alleged ''wrongdoing'' by certain officials of the BCCI. At a press conference, Bindra had even accused ICC president and former board secretary Jagmohan Dalmiya of being ''in the grip of sharks and the mafia''.

Reacting to Bindra's characterisation of tournaments in Sharjah and Toronto as ''masala and thaila (money bag)'' matches, Morarka said, "He (Bindra) had never brought any proposal to stop these matches during his presidentship of the board from 1993 to 1996.

''In our board meetings, he has never talked about it ... Walking out of meetings does not solve any problem.''

Calling Bindra an ''unguided missile'', the BCCI vice-president said: ''Whatever he has talked about others, he himself is guilty of all that.''

Jyoti Bajpai denied that in one of his reports as the manager of the Indian team (when Bindra was the BCCI president), he had referred to some players for alleged wrongdoing.

''Bindra's allegation that I had written about some players is completely wrong. No mention was made by me ... of any player.''

Bajpai also denied that he had verbally taken the names of certain players as claimed by Bindra.

''Why was no action taken on the manager's report, by Bindra, since he was the board president then?'' Morarka asked.

Morarka said the working committee meeting will be followed by an extraordinary general body meeting on May 20, to take stock of the recent controversy engulfing the game.

DDCA vice-president and former Test opener Chetan Chauhan had last week described the spate of allegations emanating from different quarters as ''sentence without trial''.

''As a former player, I am very concerned. Anybody who has proof should go to the CBI,'' he said.

Treasurer Kishen Rungta, Nirmal Mukherjee (Cricket Association of Bengal), Ram Prasad (Karnataka State Cricket Association) and Rajiv Shukla, MP, (UP Cricket Association) were among those present at the press conference.

UNI