The newly-formed Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) Working Group, constituted by IPL Chairman Rajeev Shukla, to study the Lodha Committee report and chart the roadmap for the IPL, will meet for the first time in New Delhi on Monday, TOI has learnt.
The group, which also features former India skipper and IPL Governing Council member Sourav Ganguly, BCCI secretary Anurag Thakur, treasurer Aniruddh Chaudhary and the board's legal counsel, Usha Nath Banerjee, will wrack its brains over the next four days in the Capital in an attempt to find a solution to the IPL crisis, which has seen the Supreme Court-appointed Lodha Commission suspend two teams - Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals -for two years from the league. Asked whether terminating the two teams was also an option, Shukla told TOI: "We will consider all options and take everyone's opinion before submitting our report in six weeks." This report will then be submitted to the IPL GC, which will discuss it and eventually forward it to the BCCI Working Committee. The future of CSK and RR, thus, depends on the observations of this working group.
CSK and RR were suspended for two years by the Lodha panel as punishment for betting activities of their key officials Gurunath Meiyappan and Raj Kundra during the 2013 IPL. Since the decision, there has been tremendous speculation about the future of the tournament and the two teams. Apparently, the Working Group will meet all the six team owners this week, in a bid to know their opinion. It is being speculated that the BCCI may invite two foreign teams for the next couple of years, before CSK and RR return from suspension.
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