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Lalit Modi-Vasundhara Raje: End of a friendship

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Rohit Parihar
Rohit PariharOct 30, 2014 | 12:21

Lalit Modi-Vasundhara Raje: End of a friendship

Lalit Modi, former IPL chief who is absconding in London to avoid Indian enforcement agencies has attacked his old friend Vasundhara Raje, Chief Minister of Rajasthan by tweeting for her removal.

Lalit Modi has been upset with Raje for not intervening in a coup by Amin Pathan against him that got him and his aides removed as president of Rajasthan Cricket Association (RCA) on October 11.

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Lalit Modi said in his tweet that Raje be replaced with Om Mathur. Mathur tried to build himself as her alternative in Rajasthan claiming proximity to Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Lalit Modi also accused two of Raje’s aides of running the chief minister’s office.

Amin Pathan, a local BJP leader from Kota, has been heading the BJP's minority cell but resigned after Lalit Modi’s tweets. He has been close to one of her aides. He also has been Lalit Modi’s man ever since the business baron entered BCCI through RCA with the help of Raje in her first tenure.

Lalit Modi’s tweets in fact will strengthen Raje’s image as it confirms that Raje has fallen out with him. Lalit Modi is annoyed that nobody in the BJP seems to be working to facilitate his return to India, something he had expected to happen with the change in government. He was expecting Raje as also PM Narendra Modi and BJP president Amit Shah would go out of their way to facilitate his return to India by getting investigations and cases against him dropped but that hasn’t happened. Just when he was celebrating restoration of his passport by Delhi High Court, came the coup.

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Raje, ever since she became CM in December 2013, has surprised many by keeping a distance from Modi.

The first signs of it were visible when Jaipur Development Authority was given a green signal to issue a notice to Lalit Modi-headed RCA to resume land allotted to it on which Lalit Modi has plans to build an international stadium.

Raje and Lalit Modi have been old friends. She helped RCA a lot when Lalit Modi was its president.

It was Raje’s backing that helped Lalit Modi launch IPL and buy, along with relatives, the Rajasthan Royals franchise at a rather cheap rate. The Rajasthan Royals, considered the weakest team in IPL’s first session, won the first IPL which surprised many. It led to allegations of fixing and change of pitches to suit the teams that were never investigated.

Jaipur’s SMS Cricket Stadium became the priority of the state government and was soon fitted with world-class facilities for holding matches and cricket training. That effort later helped Rajasthan win the Ranji trophy for the first time ever and than again win a second time but Lalit Modi by then had been removed from RCA.

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Outside cricket, Lalit Modi had become a huge embarrassment for Raje in her first tenure between 2003 and 2008 because of his ill treatment of senior officers.

In the past ten years, Ashok Gehlot, Congress leader, both as CM and while in opposition, mercilessly attacked Raje for her proximity to Lalit Modi. He and the opposition have accused Lalit Modi of influencing decision-making, postings and corruption in land conversions.

Lalit Modi’s presence also led to huge opposition within the BJP. This played a major role in Raje’s narrow defeat in 2008. Thereafter, Raje has never reacted to any query about Lalit Modi.

Lalit Modi faced lot of cases against him, one of which was quashed around the time when he started tweeting on October 29. This FIR was lodged against him for not keeping his promise of donating Rs 6 crore to victims of serial blasts in Jaipur. Lalit Modi, however got elected as RCA president within a few weeks after her becoming CM because of a general belief that Raje would be favouring him. However, once BCCI banned RCA from its calendar, a number of district associations and cricketers became impatient with Lalit Modi's failure to get them relief.

Pathan and a number of players met Raje and asked her to intervene.

Raje in an exclusive communiqué to India Today has denied that she ever intervened in affairs of cricket but accepted that players were concerned about the ban on their playing. She did not go out of way to save Lalit Modi as she would have done in her earlier tenure. But it is also believed that Lalit Modi’s removal helped Raje getting closer to Arun Jaitley who has been anti-Modi in BCCI and also pushed the case of Rajiv Mehrishi for appointment as finance secretary and eventually put him in reckoning for cabinet secretary.

Lalit Modi’s aide Mehmood Abdi who too has been thrown out of RCA by Amin group, has so far maintained that he would get relief through courts. The Rajasthan High Court asked Rajasthan Sports Council, headed by state appointed bureaucrats, to take control of RCA office.

The state government didn’t oppose it.

In fact, the only to save RCA from BCCI’s ban was to suspend or remove Lalit Modi. The Government itself can take over the control of RCA and ensure elections are conducted again.

It was felt that once Lalit Modi manages to return to India, bringing him into RCA won’t be difficult. But Lalit Modi got too impatient apparently after Raje emerged stronger having able to expand cabinet by her own choice. He probably felt Raje’s aides were instrumental in his removal given her growing proximity to Jaitley.

Lalit Modi has been patient, till now, having exploded earlier with tweets against Jaitley, Bhupendra Yadav, MP, and one of Raje’s aides.

His impatience now won’t help him.

Last updated: October 30, 2014 | 12:21
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