MUMBAI: Does being elected to the country's Parliament draw upon the person the mantle of immunity against punishment for past commission of offenses and trespasses?
This question came up as soon as the results of the elections to the Indian Parliament were announced last weekend. Among the past cricketers who were successful was former India captain Mohammed Azharuddin. The other two were ex-Test opener Navjot Singh Sidhu and Kirti Azad, a member of the triumphant 1983 World Cup team.
Azharuddin was slapped with a life ban by the Board of Control for Cricket in India, following his involvement in the infamous match-fixing controversy that had rocked the cricketing world in the year 2000. The other Indian players who were banned were Ajay Sharma and Ajay Jadeja. The international players involved were South African captain Hansie Cronje, since dead, and Pakistani all-rounder Salim Malik.
It may be recalled that after a prolonged court battle, Salim Malik has only recently been liberated from the life ban. Jadeja had got his ban lifted after a couple of years' battle in a court of law. Azharuddin's court case is still going on and he had to seek special permission to allow him to contest the Lok Sabha (Parliamentary) polls. He won with a thumping majority from Muradabad, a town in Uttar Pradesh, far removed from his home in Hyderabad.
Azharudin's success at the hustings has brought in its wake two urgent demands from his supporters. The first is to pressurize the BCCI to lift the life ban imposed on him and, if that is not possible, to expedite the legal recourse so that the cricketer is liberated and does not carry the stigma into his new political career.
Take the case of an "attempted murder" charge against Navjot Singh Sidhu. When he was a member of Parliament, the sentence had been pronounced against him by the court, with a provision to appeal in a higher court. Sidhu resigned his Lok Sabha seat and after the appeal, he was given permission to contest again.
The question to ask now is whether the BCCI will lift the ban on Azharuddin or will he carry on as a member of Parliament with no right to indulge in any cricketing activity, as an official or an administrator, nor even have the right to enter a cricket stadium where matches are conducted under the aegis of the BCCI and/or the ICC? Many people still do not know that wherever international matches are played, under the control of the International Cricket Council, among others, a photograph of Azharuddin, is pasted outside the players' dressing room, declaring him a "persona non grata." Over the years, some of the photos have been removed from the list. Will Azharuddin's be the next to vanish? Will an elected seat in the Indian Parliament also earn him the right to wash away a near 10-year old stigma?
