Where in the world is Lalit Modi?

Modi’s current coordinates on this glittering itinerary of leisure is in Bali, for another holiday in a rented house. This will be followed by Bangkok, where his father, K.K. Modi, will celebrate his 70th birthday later this month. And then to perhaps another party, which prompts a BCCI official to chuckle: “He calls himself a businessman? He certainly holidays like no other businessman in history. Reminds me of how he dropped everything and camped in Rajasthan for years to get into cricket administration!”

The feeling in the board is that if Modi had any belief in winning his fight to keep control over the IPL, he’d have offered a bitter, tooth-and-nail fight. “This is the only venture he’s been successful in life, after countless failures in business, and he’d hate to give it up,” says a BCCI official. “However, the fact that he’s staying out of India instead of fighting it out suggests he’s aware of the futility of it all. Instead, he’s just arguing that the BCCI committee is biased, and wants its members to recuse themselves.”