BCCI suspends Jagmohan Dalmiya

Chennai, Apr 10 (UNI) Former BCCI President Jagmohan Dalmiya today suffered a major blow when the cricket board's Working Committee suspended him from participating in any affairs of the Board on charges of misappropriation.

He was charged with illegally operating one of the accounts of the 1996 World Cup, which was jointly staged by India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

Announcing this at a crowded press conference here today, BCCI Treasurer N Srinivasan said the BCCI Working Committee, which met at Mumbai yesterday, felt that action had to be initiated against Mr Dalmiya for indulging in illegal transactions and authorised BCCI President Sharad Pawar to take a decision on the issue.

''Following this the BCCI President issued the suspension orders last night,'' he added.

Mr Srinivasan said further action would be initiated against Mr Dalmiya, who is the President of of the Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB), by the Disciplinary Committee of the BCCI.

Mr Srinivasan said Mr Dalmiya had illegally carried out transactions from the 'Indcom' account with an IOB branch at Kolkata. He said the transactions were unauthorised as Mr Dalmiya was no longer the Board Secretary in 1997 as he had resigned from the post to become the President of the International Cricket Council (ICC). The former BCCI chief had appointed Mr K M Chowdhury of CAB to operate the account.

Mr Srinivasan added that Mr Dalmiya, inspite of claiming that all the accounts were audited, had not produced any audited books. ''We had to obtain details of these transactions from the bank. In all there were 217 transactions,'' he said.

The BCCI treasurer clarified that when the Indcom accounts were opened, as per the Board's Constitution, only the Secretary and the Treasurer were authorised to operate it. ''But, Mr Dalmiya had resigned from that post.'' When questioned about the illegal transaction in a showcause notice issued to him, Mr Dalmiya said it was an imprest account, Mr Srinivasan said.

Mr Srinivasan said the illegal transactions by Mr Dalmiya amounted to misappropriation. Taking into consideration the gravity of the offence, it was decided to refer the matter to the disciplinary committee. ''This is a question of lack of probity'', he added. Answering to a question about the alleged misuse of funds for the BCCI Platinum Jubilee Celebrations, Mr Srinivasan said similar issues would be taken up in course of time.

He also indicated that the Disciplinary Committee would come out with its recommendations in a week's time on the action to be taken against Mr Dalmiya.

UNI