Calcutta: Five months after The Telegraph exposed an absolute lack of fiscal transparency in the functioning of the Hyderabad Cricket Association (HCA), the High Court of Judicature at Hyderabad appointed two administrators to run the in-deep-mess body.

On Thursday, the High Court hand-picked Justice Anil R. Dave, a former judge of the Supreme Court and a former Chief Justice of the Andhra Pradesh High Court, and Justice (Retired) GV Seethapathy, who served as a judge of the Andhra Pradesh High Court.

Both, therefore, won't be seen strictly as outsiders.

One understands that the HCA is actually without funds and its staff has been on strike for at least a week. That apart, while the old office-bearers maintained that theirs was the elected body, a faction claimed that it had gone through the procedures and elected a totally different lot.

"Chaotic... Totally chaotic," somebody senior associated with the Board of Control for Cricket in India told this Reporter.

There's no doubt that the HCA played the biggest role in inviting ignominy and the administrators simply had to be appointed after the scathing "observations" of Prof. Ratnakar S. Shetty, the Board's observer for last month's one-off Test between India and Bangladesh.

Prof. Shetty's "observations," which covered just about every aspect, were placed before the High Court by the Board on February 24.

Among other things, Prof. Shetty commented on the following:

• That the tendering process followed by the HCA had been "far from transparent." Specifically, most contracts had only one vendor bidding and, in some cases, no bids were called for.

• Vendor M/S Sanjay Maintenance Services, which had been awarded 10 annual maintenance contracts for a payment of approximately Rs 10 lakh per month, was given "separate contracts for similar scope of work on the match days."

• The HCA office-bearers and executive committee members were "more keen to protect their own vote banks by giving free tickets and buffet lunch coupons to the members." Almost 50 per cent of the catering bills amounting to Rs 75 lakh went towards the officials and members.

• "More than 25 per cent" of the tickets were made complimentary by the HCA's office-bearers and executive committee members.

• Syed Moizuddin, a former vice-president of the HCA, who'd demitted office in accordance with the Supreme Court's orders, had been "actively involved in the tendering process and in the award of contracts."

Quite bizarre, to say the least.

The day's development is much more bad news for the Board, which is itself being administered by a four-member committee appointed by the Supreme Court.

First, the Board was taken away from the hands of elected administrators and, then, the controversy-ridden Delhi and District Cricket Association saw the appointment of Justice (Retired) Vikramjit Sen as its administrator. Justice Sen took charge following an order of the Delhi High Court.

Today, of course, the HCA is in the same boat. It's certainly not the first cricket body to be run by court-appointed administrators and, by all accounts, won't be the last either.