Rajat Bhatia to play for Uttarakhand as confusion prevails over DDCA selector role

The newly formed Cricket Committee of the Delhi and District Cricket Association (DDCA) — comprising of Virender Sehwag, Aakash Chopra, Rahul Sanghvi and Gautam Gambhir — had named Rajat Bhatia and Parvinder Awana as selectors of the senior and junior Delhi teams respectively. Bhatia though is yet to receive a formal appointment letter or any information from DDCA and has thus decided to represent Uttarakhand in the upcoming domestic season as a guest player.

Speaking to Hindustan Times, Bhatia said that he had no idea on the status of his appointment as selector of the state team and with the rules suggesting that he is ineligible, he took up the offer when officials from Uttarakhand approached him to represent them in domestic cricket.

“I have got no information on the status of my appointment as selector of the Delhi senior team. As far as I know, the rules say a person must have retired five years previously and I have not done that. With not much information coming from the DDCA on this, I felt that it is best that I continue to play the game. I did take a break for a year last season, but I haven’t given up playing as yet,” he informed.

Approving the suggestion of the Lodha Panel, the Supreme Court order states that a player can only be eligible to become a national selector “if he has retired from the game at least five years previously”. And state bodies are also expected to abide by the same rules.

The members of the Uttarakhand Cricket Consensus Committee formed by the Committee of Administrators met in Dehradun to chalk out the plans for the participation of the Uttarakhand teams in the different domestic tournaments for the 2018-19 season. In a mail sent to BCCI CEO Rahul Johri by Ratnakar Shetty – member of the consensus committee – Bhatia had been named as one of the three guest players who will represent the senior team in different domestic tournaments organised by BCCI.

“We will engage the services of three guest players as permitted by BCCI and that too only for the senior tournaments where we require experience. The three guest players for the senior team for 2018-19 are Rajat Bhatia, Vinit Saxena and Malolan Rangarajan,” the letter read.

DDCA’s Cricket Committee had already raised eyebrows by selecting Bhatia as senior team selector because he is yet to retire from the game.

First Published: Aug 22, 2018 14:08 IST