Veteran cricket administrator Jagmohan Dalmiya was on Monday unanimously elected President of the BCCI but the N. Srinivasan camp suffered a huge setback with rival faction's Anurag Thakur beating Sanjay Patel for the post of Secretary at the Board's Annual General Meeting (AGM) held in Chennai. Kerala Cricket Association President T.C. Mathew was elected as one of the five Vice-Presidents of the cricket board. Barring Himachal Pradesh Cricket Association chief Thakur's surprise win, ruling camp loyalists swept the elections for the other posts at the much-postponed AGM, where Srinivasan himself could not contest for the President's post owing to a Supreme Court directive. Jharkhand Cricket Association's Amitabha Chodhary was elected the Joint Secretary beating Goa's Chetan Desai, belonging to the anti-Srinivasan faction, while Haryana's Anirudh Choudhary won the treasurer's position by defeating Rajiv Shukla. While three Vice-Presidents were elected unopposed, the two other positions also went to the Srinivasan faction with T.C. Mathew (Kerala, west zone) and C.K. Khanna (Delhi, central zone) winning the polls. Khanna defeated the influential Jyotiraditya Scindia, while Mathew edged past Ravi Sawant. The three who were elected unopposed are Andhra's Gokaraju Gangaraju (south zone), Assam's Goutam Roy (east) with M.L. Nehru of Jammu and Kashmir representing the north zone. The road for Dalmiya was cleared after Pawar failed to get a proposer from east zone, prompting the Maratha strongman to pull out of the race. BJP leader Thakur, it is learnt, won by just one vote (15-14) over Srinivasan loyalist Patel, a scenario unlikely to have emerged had there not been cross-voting during the election process. However, the fact that other anti-Srinivasan camp candidates lost the elections proved that cross-voting took place only for Thakur.Dalmiya's elevation to the top position has been necessitated by Srinivasan being forced to stay away from the election owing to a Supreme Court directive. Srinivasan could only vote during Monday's electoral process. In fact, the AGM itself has been delayed for a while now owing to the legal battle that Srinivasan is fighting in the top court. The apex court is currently hearing the IPL spot-fixing scandal in which conflict of interest with regards Srinivasan's position as BCCI President and IPL team owner has come in for sharp criticism from court.
