Shashank Manohar resigned as the president of the Board of Control for Cricket in India on Tuesday. He has also stepped down as the BCCI's representative in the ICC, reported NDTV. The move was on the cards, as the 58-year-old administrator is in the running for the post of the International Cricket Council's first independent chairman.
BCCI Secretary Anurag Thakur confirmed the news, telling ANI that in order to be eligible for the ICC's top post, a candidate must be independent and not affiliated to any other governing body. The elections for ICC chairman are scheduled for later this month.
The Supreme Court-appointed Justice Lodha committee had also recommended that no administrator should occupy two posts at the same time in different governing bodies.
Manohar took over as BCCI president in October last year after previous president Jagmohan Dalmiya died. "In the present scenario, he [Manohar] knows he can't do much in the BCCI with the way the Supreme Court is viewing things," Cricbuzz quoted an official as saying.
"The ICC post gives him a stable five-year window and an opportunity to make history as possibly the administrator who brought all countries together, and struck off the so-called monopoly of the Big Three," he added. The so-called Big Three of international cricket are India, Australia and England.
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