Dalmiya's election a 'victory of evil over good': Buddhadeb

NEW DELHI: The Indian politicians' proverbial itch to interfere in the affairs of sports bodies was again on display when West Bengal chief minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharya on Monday kept up his attack on the democratically-elected president of the state's Cricket board, Jagmohan Dalmiya. The chief minister went so far as to describe Mr Dalmiya's election as a “victory of evil over good”.

The chief minister had tried hard to get Dalmiya out of the cricket association and openly backed his challenger in the election. But this was not appreciated by his own partymen, a fact which became evident when the man who can claim to legitimately speak on the issue, sports minister Subhas Chakraborty, spoke out against the anti-Dalmiya campaign.

The chief minister, however, appears to be in no mood to abandon his campaign. He vowed to continue the fight to remove the cricket administrator from the CAB in the interests of the game.

“So far as I'm concerned, I'll not compromise with this man. The battle will continue. I want him to leave this post. I want him to leave the organisation,” the combative chief minister said.

The sports minister had on Sunday night hinted that the result would not go in favour of the CM. “It will be a bit of an embarrassment to the chief minister as his nominee, Kolkata Police Comissioner Prasun Mukherjee could not win,” Mr Chakraborty had said.

He also said that he had congratulated Mr Dalmiya on his re-election as “Prasun Mukherjee's defeat proved that political interference in cricket was wrong”.

Incidentally, Mr Bhattacharya is not the only chief minister who has been trying to interfere in the functioning of cricket boards. Rajasthan chief minister Vasundhara Raje is the mentor of the state cricket association boss.