SLOG OVERS: BCCI president Jagmohan Dalmiya, HCA secretary Ranbir Singh and DDCA chief Arun Jaitley. Photo: AFP/PTI

Back in the Sixties, India was faced with a troubled question: after Nehru, who? The answer — Lal Bahadur Shastri — emerged slowly. Now, in the new millennium, when faced with a similar question — after Dalmiya, who? — the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), it seems, didn’t have to wait that long. It has devised a quick, novel answer: Dalmiya himself. For even as the Calcutta-based BCCI president gets ready to say goodbye after completing a successful and maximum three-year term, a move to retain his services reaches endgame.

Come September and Indian cricket’s 75-year-old apex body is likely to have its first ever patron-in-chief: Jagmohan Dalmiya. And, in doing so, ensure that Dalmiya keeps his fingers firmly in the pie of the world’s richest cricket board.

At first glance, the post appears to be ceremonial. But, Dalmiya-backers have worked out a detailed plan that will ensure substantial powers to him. BCCI watchers believe that such a move will create an alternative power centre in the Board.

With Dalmiya’s latest avatar being a new addition to the existing BCCI power structure, the office-bearers’ elections next month become a whole new ball game. For any presidential candidate this year, finding the right equation with the likely patron-in-chief could be the key to winning.

It all started with a letter penned by Bikash Barua, secretary of the Assam Cricket Association (ACA), last month, which was circulated to various state cricket associations. It declared that “Indian cricket without Jagmohan Dalmiya cannot be dreamt of” and that one “should think again and again how we can have the versatile Dalmiya in the right and deserving place”. Dalmiya wouldn’t comment on this. And though the ACA secretary says the initiative was entirely his, BCCI sources say the move wouldn’t have been possible without Dalmiya’s blessings.

And now, practically everyone who’s anybody in Indian cricket administration — from former chiefs Raj Singh Dungarpur and I.S. Bindra to state association bosses such as Orissa’s Prabhat Kumar Mishra — is eager to explain why Dalmiya deserves the post. Their reasons: he is an excellent cricket administrator proven at home and abroad; he is the first and only Indian to be the International Cricket Council (ICC) chief; he still wields global clout and, last but not the least, he is a guru of marketing.

Says former BCCI president Dungarpur, hardly a Dalmiya fan, “Such a move doesn’t create a good precedent. But if anybody is qualified for the post, Dalmiya is. His acceptability is total.” Even Bindra, who spat venom at the Calcutta-based cricket administrator a few years ago, concedes, “He certainly has the credentials.”

BCCI watchers feel that a working committee meeting to be held tomorrow could be “a trial of strength and a testing of waters”, although its official agenda relates merely to the release of an annual report.

Dalmiya’s reincarnation is likely to take place in a Special General Body Meeting (SGBM), to be held possibly in Calcutta on September 12, ahead of the Annual General Body Meeting (AGBM) in the last week of September. A resolution is likely to be placed at the SGBM proposing Dalmiya’s name for patron-in-chief. He would need 16 ayes in a 31 vote scenario — 30 cricket associations plus one president’s vote — to sail through. “That should not be a problem,” says a BCCI insider.

Since a patron’s role is not spelt out in the constitution, the SGBM will endow him with certain powers through a resolution. The general idea is to give him enough powers till 2007 so that he can attend BCCI meetings and represent the BCCI in the ICC and the Asian Cricket Council meetings. “This will enable him to look into the 2003 World Cup compensation case as well as players’ contracts for the 2007 World Cup,” says P.M. Rungta, president, Rajasthan Cricket Association.

But the existence of a patron-in-chief, that too with considerable powers, could be a possible source of constant friction and tension between the president and the patron. And, it is in this backdrop that insiders feel the latest edition of the BCCI office-bearers’ election next month will have a new twist in the tale.

The most nail-biting contests in Indian cricket, they say, have not happened on the playing pitches, but inside the BCCI boardrooms. BCCI elections are Hitchcockian in suspense; where promised patronage in the form of a foreign trip as manager or similar perks turn foes into friends overnight and where the denouement has often depended on a last, desperate switch of a single vote. No surprise, most keep their cards close to their chest even as they try to be on the winning side of the Board.

At the moment, the top two contenders for the president’s post are Ranbir Singh, secretary of the Haryana Cricket Association and the Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA) president Arun Jaitley.

Jaitley, a former Union minister of law, is unwilling to reveal his cards. “I have nothing to say on the subject,” he says, when asked whether he is interested in the BCCI’s top job. But Singh is more forthcoming. “I will contest for the post of president,” he says.

As in the best of BCCI traditions, this promises to be another tight contest. Earlier this March, when India was Shining, Jaitley was said to be the front-runner. So much so that one of the DDCA bosses was overheard boasting to Pakistan Cricket Board ofificals during the India-Pakistan cricket series that he was the chief troubleshooter of the next BCCI president.

But with the BJP out of power at the Centre, Jaitley faces a hard struggle ahead. Both Jaitley and Dalmiya are said to be on good terms but, as a former BCCI official points out, for Dalmiya, backing the BJP politician’s candidature may not be the right move. “He may not like to take on the government on this,” says a BCCI source. Another BCCI official points out, “Both are strong personalities and that can lead to friction while working.” However, Dungarpur is of the view that both are capable administrators who can together make an “excellent team”.

Jaitley, cricket watchers say, is making moves for the election. Last week a Hindi newspaper reported that the DDCA president had a lengthy discussion with Rahul Gandhi during a dinner at a newspaper editor’s house earlier this month. The idea was to influence those associations headed by the Congress to vote for him.

The BJP politician faces a tough contest with Singh, a lawyer by profession and a BCCI veteran. Son of former Haryana chief minister Bansi Lal, he has ruled the state’s cricket over the past decade. One group believes that is more suitable to the emerging needs of the new BCCI where power has to be shared with the patron-in-chief. Says a BCCI source, “He can take care of the domestic side of the BCCI while Dalmiya can look after the international aspect.” On his part, the Haryana cricket secretary is accommodating. “I believe that a President can enjoy the benefits of the patron-in-chief’s rich experience,” he says.

With more than a month to go before the BCCI elections in the last week of September, alliances are still being made and unmade. But at the moment it appears that while Singh is being backed by more associations in the east and the south, Jaitley holds an edge in the west.

Names of other prospective presidential candidates to have done the rounds include Rajya Sabha member Rajeev Shukla, who represents the UP Cricket Association and Kamal Morarka, who represents the Rajasthan Cricket Association and is regarded as a loyalist of former Prime Minister Chandra Shekhar. Technically both are ineligible for presidency this time, since they belong to the central zone. The BCCI follows a zonal rotational policy — though the process has been circumvented in the past — and it is the north’s term this time.

Many believed that Samajwadi Party (SP) leader Amar Singh too had thrown his hat into the ring when he recently got himself nominated to the Cricket Association of Bengal’s (CAB) working committee. The theory got credence because Sahara, a corporate group with plans to launch a sports channel, was backing him. It is believed that Sahara, currently sponsors of the Indian team, would eventually also like to telecast the games.

The SP leader doesn’t deny the fact that he was “compelled” by the Sahara boss to get into the CAB and that the company is indeed interested in cricket telecast rights. “What is wrong with that? Let there be competition,” says Amar Singh — who stresses that he himself is not in the election game right now.

For the moment, the battle is between Arun Jaitley and Ranbir Singh with the shadow of a likely patron-in-chief, Jagmohan Dalmiya, looming over them. It is still an open race.

But one thing is certain. Whoever wins, Dalmiya will play the patron.