Former India cricketer Bishan Singh Bedi has asked the DDCA to remove his name from the spectators’ stand after the body decided to install a statue of its late former President Arun Jaitley at the Feroz Shah Kotla ground. The stand was named after the spin legend in November 2017 along with Mohinder Amarnath.
The 74-year-old lashed out at the Delhi and District Cricket Association and went on to criticize it for promoting nepotism and putting administrators ahead of cricketers.
In a harsh letter addressed to DDCA President Rohan Jaitley, the son of the Arun Jaitley who passed away last year, Bedi wrote “I pride myself as a man of immense tolerance and patience…but all that I’m afraid, is running out. DDCA has truly tested me and forced me to take this drastic action.”
“So, Mr President I request you to remove my name from the stand named after me with immediate effect. Also, I hereby renounce my DDCA membership,” he wrote.
Arun Jaitley served as the DDCA president for 14 years, from 1999 to 2013, before he quit cricket administration. In a bid to honour his memory, the body has decided to install a six-foot statue of him at the Kotla.
“I’ve taken this decision with sufficient deliberations. I’m not prone to disregard the honour that was bestowed upon me. But as we all know with honour comes responsibility. They feted me for the total respect and integrity with which I played the game.”
“And now I’m returning the honour just to assure them all that four decades after my retirement, I still retain those values.”
Bedi also made it clear that he never liked Arun Jaitley’s style of working and has always stood against what he did not agree with.
“My reservations about the choice of people he hand-picked to run the day to day affairs of DDCA is well known. I remember walking out from a meeting at his residence whence he was unable to throw out a rowdy element using terribly foul language.”
“I think I was too head strong..too Old school..& too proud an Indian cricketer to be co-opted into the corrupt darbar of sycophants Arun Jaitley mustered at the Kotla during his stewardship.”
“After the Feroze Shah Kotla was named hurriedly & most undeservingly after Late Arun Jaitley my reaction then was maybe somehow good sense might prevail to keep Kotla sacrosanct.”
“How wrong I was. Now I gather a statue of Late Arun Jaitley is going to be installed at the Kotla. I’m not at all enamoured with the thought of a statue of Arun Jaitley coming up at Kotla.”
According to Bedi, it is the parliament that needs to remember Arun Jaitley as he was primarily a politician. He went on to point out how legendary cricketers were honoured in other countries.
“This is not a rhetorical assessment but a factual appraisal of his time at DDCA. Take my word, failures don’t need to be celebrated with plaques & busts. They need to be forgotten.”
“People who surround you presently will never inform you that it’s WG Grace at Lord’s..Sir Jack Hobbs at the Oval..Sir Donald Bradman at the SCG…Sir Garfield Sobers at Barbados & Shane Warne of recent vintage at the MCG…who adorn their cricket stadia with the Spirit of Cricket never out of place..”
“…Sporting arenas need sporting role models. The place of the administrators is in their glass cabins.
“Since DDCA doesn’t understand this Universal cricket culture, I need to walk out of it. I can’t be part of a stadium which has got its priorities so grossly wrong & where administrators get precedence over the cricketers. Please bring down my name from the stand with immediate effect.”