CoA members tussle over India women coach selection process

The appointment of India women coach was made amid bitter war of words between both CoA members over the selection process.

Vinod Rai and Diana Edulji were divided over the selection process of women's coach.

The controversy regarding the appointment of India women’s cricket coach is far from over. Even as the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) named former India cricketer, W.V. Raman, as the coach late on Thursday, the disagreement in the Committee of Administrator (CoA) was wide open. The CoA chief, Vinod Rai, asked BCCI GM, Cricket Operations, Syed Saba Karim to announce the new coach, while the other member, Diana Edulji, instructed them to keep the announcement ‘in abeyance until the CoA reaches a common agreement’.

In an email exchange, which Sportstar has accessed - Rai gave a go-ahead to Karim because “it will be unfair not to do so since the selection committee was constituted with Diana suggesting names.”

In reply to the mail, Edulji wrote: “The entire process of selecting a qualified coach for women’s cricket team is unconstitutional. I once again reiterate that we have been assigned the role of implementing the Lodha reforms which says the Coach of the Indian Team can be only be appointment by the CAC.”

Read: W.V. Raman appointed Indian women's team coach

While Rai insisted that the process of naming the coach should go ahead as the ad-hoc committee had members suggested by Edulji, the latter shot back, saying: “I would suggest you to read my email to the legal team assisting COA wherein I had specifically asked a number of questions including the first one being whether CoA had the power of forming such an ad-hoc committee. Do not confuse my suggestion for a few names as my approval for the ad-hoc committee since the first question in that email among many to legal was whether the CoA has powers to appoint the ad-hoc committee to which the legal replied that we did not have the powers as per the new registered constitution.”

In his e-mail, Rai also stated that the selection process was approved by a noted jurist, who he did not name. Edulji hit back, stating: “With due respect to the Learned Jurist who gave the legal opinion, I wish to state that permission from CoA was not sought for taking this legal opinion and if the legal opinion was with the CEO and GM - Operations, then why was the opinion not circulated to us before and brought to our attention only after the interviews started. This is also a financial burden on BCCI without the permission of the COA.”

Interestingly, the media advisory sent out by the BCCI, confirming the appointment of Raman, doesn’t have a signatory. All recent media releases from the Board had signature of the acting honorary secretary, Amitabh Choudhary, who too had opposed the appointment.