BCCI pitch committee chairman quits

G Kasturirangan, the chairman of the BCCI's ground and pitches committee, has resigned on health grounds. According to reports in the Indian media Kasturirangan, who has not been in the best of health for a while now, had sent in his resignation a month ago. It was formally accepted during BCCI's working committee meeting held in the beginning of this month.

Oddly, no word of this decision crept out to the media for almost three weeks after it was made. Jagmohan Dalmiya, when queried on this matter by The Indian Express, said: "It was not [such] an important issue that the media needed to be informed. The chairman of one of the many committees of the BCCI has resigned and there's nothing big about it."

The ground and pitches committee, however, was more than just "one of many committees". Entrusted with the task of creating competitive pitches in India, they performed a valuable task in Indian cricket. And Kasturirangan, according to unnamed sources quoted by The Indian Express, was "frustrated" by the lackadaisical approach of the BCCI.

Nadeem Memon, the curator in charge of the Mumbai and Ahmedabad centres, expressed a similar opinion to the newspaper. "Kasturi was doing a great job," he said, "but he was not given a free hand. Unfortunately, even in an off-season like this, they have not done anything concrete."

Kasturirangan himself was not willing to comment. "At the age of 73 I do not wish to get embroiled in any controversies," he said. "Please keep me out of it. I want to be away from all of this."