Former India pacer Venkatesh Prasad resigned from his post of chairman of junior selection panel. He was at the helm for 30 months and in all likelihood, is certain to join the KXIP franchise as bowling coach. He resigned to avoid the conflict of interest issue.
Now it has been reported that Ashish Kapoor, the former Delhi and India off-spinner will make his return to the junior selection panel. Kapoor was previously part of the five member selection committee, before it was trimmed according to the Lodha Commission recommendations.
The other two members of the panel currently are former Uttar Pradesh all-rounder Gyanendra Pandey and former Baroda batsman Rakesh Parikh.
“In all likelihood, Ashish will make a comeback into the junior selection panel now that Venky has resigned. In case of Jatin Paranjpe and Gagan Khoda, they can’t be senior national selectors again as they are not Test players. But in case of Ashish and Amit, there was no problem with eligibility criteria,” a senior BCCI official told PTI.
“They had to make way because the other three (Prasad, Pandey and Parikh) were appointed in September 2015 and these two (Kapoor and Sharma) in 2016. Now with Venky gone, it’s only fair that Ashish makes a comeback as he has better credentials than Amit. He will in any case be the only Test cricketer in junior panel. Unless Committee Of Administrators (COA) has something completely different on their mind, it’s going to be Ashish,” said the official.
It has been believed that a big reason behind Venkatesh Prasad resigning was that he was not considered for the post of GM (Cricket Operations). The BCCI also did not announce any cash reward for the junior panel despite the U-19 side winning the World Cup.
The official said, “Look, everyone also looks at the financial benefits of any deal. One can’t fault Venky if he is looking at an opportunity with an IPL franchise where he would get paid significantly more for a period of 7 weeks compared to what he draws as per annum salary from the BCCI.”
(With inputs from PTI and Hindustan Times)
