Thaindian News

Kolkata, Jan 8 (IANS) The Indian cricket board is trying to hammer out an acceptable solution to the problem of possible dual representations from states in three of the five zones during the coming selection committee meetings for the Duleep Trophy tournament. Disclosing this to reporters here Thursday, president of Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB) Jagmohan Dalmiya, however, ruled out any confrontation with the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) on the issue. “We will go by the BCCI decision,” Dalmiya said.

As per the new rules of the board, the national selectors from each of the five zones are nominated by the board.

Earlier, the selection panel members from each zone were first nominated by the state, and in case of more than one candidate from a zone, the final selection was done through voting. The elected five were then named selection committee chiefs in their respective states and chaired zonal selection panel meetings for the Duleep Trophy as representatives of their states.

But with the board changing the rules, in three of the zones a unique problem has risen.

For instance in the CAB, while former state cricketer Raja Vankat was named selector from the East Zone, former Bengal Ranji Trophy captain Sambaran Banerjee was nominated chief selector of the state side.

While, as per a BCCI directive, the national selector from the zone would chair the Duleep Trophy selection meeting, the CAB has decided to nominate Banerjee as its representative at the meeting.

Thus, Venkat and Banerjee - both belonging to Bengal - are on a collision course on attending the East Zone Duleep Trophy meeting slated to be held Saturday.

Similar problems exist in the South and West Zones.

In South Zone, national selection committee chief Krishnamachari Srikkanth, who is from Tamil Nadu, finds that he has not been named to represent his home state Tamil Nadu. Similar is the predicament of national selector from West Zone Surendra Bhave, who is from Maharashtra.

“There is some confusion. The matter came up for discussion at the last working committee meeting of the board. And it was decided that the board will come out with something on the issue urgently. We are awaiting the board decision,” Dalmiya added.