BCCI president Sharad Pawar with former chief Jagmohan Dalmiya in Mumbai before Sunday’s working committee meeting. (AFP)

Mumbai: The new Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) dispensation on Sunday took the first step towards professionalising the functioning of the body by deciding to appoint an exter- nal agency to provide a suitable recommendation to this effect.

In other sweeping moves, the BCCI’s working committee ? which met here on Sunday ? also decided to appoint a legal cell, a media committee and a constitution review committee.

The committee also decided to reconstitute its marketing committee with president Sharad Pawar himself at its helm and has given directions to clear the controversial TV rights issues before the Indian team departs for Pakistan.

In this context, the committee has also authorised Pawar to constitute the legal cell and take steps to resolve the pending court cases involving the BCCI. Shashank Manohar of Vidarbha and leading Supreme Court lawyer Kapil Sibal will be two of the members of the legal committee.

Significantly, former BCCI and ICC chief Jagmohan Dalmiya did not figure in any of the sub-committees formed although he attended the working committee meeting.

Queried on the issue, Pawar, who fought and won a bitter battle for supremacy with Dalmiya, said: “He is still a member of the working committee and we would like to draw on his vast experience (as cricket administrator).”

The working committee also decided to finalise the much-awaited new players’ contracts and the team’s sponsor at the earliest. “The ground work has been done and it would be finalised before the Indian team’s departure for Pakistan,” Pawar said.

The resignation of Dalmiya as president of Asian Cricket Council (ACC) and Afro-Asian Cricket Cooperation also came up for discussion in the meeting.

Pawar said the ACC presidentship will be institutionalised by which the president of the member association, whose turn it is to head the Asian body, will head the ACC. Since it’s India’s turn now, Pawar is going to be the new president of the continental body.

Pawar said the BCCI headquarters would remain in Mumbai and unveiled a prototype of the new facilities which is to be housed inside the Mumbai Cricket Association (MCC). Pawar, incidentally, is also the MCC president.

THE POWERS-THAT-ARE

CONSTITUTION REVIEW COMMITTEE
Shashank Manohar (chairman), I.S. Bindra, N. Srinivasan, Lalit Modi, Arun Jaitley, Ratnakar Shetty.
CRICKET DEVELOPMENT COMMITTEE
Kapil Dev (chairman), Laxman Sivaramakrishnan, Dilip Vengsarkar, Hanumant Singh, Arun Lal, Ravi Shastri
DISCIPLINARY COMMITTEE
Sharad Pawar, Shashank Manohar, Chirayu Amin.
GROUNDS & PITCHES COMMITTEE
Dhiraj Parsana (West), Daljit Singh (North), P.R. Vishwanathan (South), Tapash Chatterjee (Central), Probir Mukherjee (East). Convener: Niranjan Shah.
HEADQUARTERS COMMITTEE
I.S. Bindra, N. Srinivasan, Niranjan Shah, Lalchand Rajput.
LEGAL COMMITTEE
Shashank Manohar (chairman), Kapil Sibal. Note: One or two more names in the committee will be added later.
MARKETING COMMITTEE
Sharad Pawar, Lalit Modi, Dayanand Narvekar, K.P. Kajaria, Chirayu Amin, Shashank Manohar, Niranjan Shah, M.P. Pandove, N. Srinivasan, I.S. Bindra, A.C. Muthiah, Ranbir Singh Mahendra

MEDIA COMMITTEE
Rajiv Shukla, G.S. Walia (North), K.L. Balaji (South), Rajan Nair (Central), Milind Rege (West), Raja Venkat (East); Convener: Niranjan Shah.
NATIONAL CRICKET ACADEMY
Ajay Shirke (vice-chairman), Shivlal Yadav (director), Lalchand Rajput (coaching director), Ashok Bhagwat, Sunil Dev, Gopal Bose. Note: All BCCI office-bearers are also part of the academy as ex-officio members. The chairman has not been named.