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After Pawar it was the turn of Farooq Abdullah, president of the Jammu and Kashmir Cricket Association to spend five minutes in the glare of the media. "There was a need for change and it has taken place in the best way," he said. "Just like in general elections where Prime Ministers come and go in the most democractic manner. Similarly here the results were declared and both sides have accepted it. Dalmiya has withdrawn all the objections [he had earlier raised]." Abdullah called this move of Dalmiya's "honourable" and praised Dalmiya for the work he had done.

As a parting shot he added,"Hopefully in the future there will be no need for elections to be conducted by someone else [from outside the BCCI]."

If Sharad Pawar's entry was grand, Jagmohan Dalmiya's began quietly, as he emerged down a corridoor in the hotel. But as he neared the room where the AGM was to take place the noise level went through the roof. Television cameramen and photographers numbering more than 100, packed into a small galley, fell over each other to get a picture. The frenzy reached such a crescendo that the hotel staff were forced to step up and threaten to throw the whole lot out if they could not work without disturbing the peace.

Meanwhile unconfirmed reports are filtering thick and fast that many representations were made to the court-appointed observer in the wee hours of the morning. The rumour is that rival factions in the three contentious associations - Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh and Bihar/Jharkhand - would be allowed to vote, in sealed envelopes. Then, on resoltion of which group was deemed the authorised representative, the vote would be counted.

Genuine grievances or depserate delay tactics from a incumbent seeing his grasp on power slipping? Watch this space ...

Sirens wailing, a convoy of at least 18 cars of all shapes and sizes screeched into the portico at the Taj Bengal. Commando forces fanned out, automoatic weapons on the ready, sealing off the door as Sharad Pawar, with Farooq Abdullah, who enjoys Z+ security, by his side. Soon after, just as Pawar stepped into the hotel the media swooped. If you cut a flank of raw beef and threw it into a tank of starving piranhas the feeding frenzy that would ensue would pale in comparison to the television channels' hunger for a quick quote. Questions flew thick and fast, in many languages, but Pawar barely whispered in answer and, before you know it, was escorted away.

About fifteen minutes earlier, the first party had already arrived, in quieter but no less strident fashion - IS Bindra and Lalit Modi stepped out of a shiny new Mercedes Benz, dressed in sharp suits, showing no signs of being worse for wear after the pre-election party that apparently rocked their hotel on Monday night.

The Taj Bengal hotel, the battleground for the presidential elections of the Board of Control for Cricket in India was quiet - the calm before the storm - save for earlybird journalists. Kolkata's top cops were also roused early and went about securing the hotel, in anticipation of the arrival of a union minister. The Sharad Pawar group, staying at a different hotel about five kilometres away, went in to breakfast at around 9.30, all together in a special room sealed off from the public. Some members chose to stay neutral - and not stay at either of the camp's hotels while several key players were still trickling in, on early morning flights from across the country. There was some doubt that fog could delay flights, but that did not happen.