Mumbai:
Shashi Tharoor's Officer on Special Duty (OSD) Jacob Jospeh has now joined the tweet war, going straight for Lalit Modi's jugular.
Jacob has posted a link to a recent newspaper article that alleged that Lalit Modi was convicted of possessing drugs, kidnapping and assault in the US during his days as a university student.
The conviction, the article says, came after Modi confessed to committing the offences before a US court.
The article quotes Modi's lawyers as saying that he did not serve the two-year jail sentence as he was let off on probation, and the county court did not give a final decision on his sentencing for drugs possession.
According to the newspaper report: "In 1985, General Court of Justice, Durham County, had charged Modi with kidnapping, assault and possession of 400 grams of cocaine, court documents show. He then entered a 'plea bargain', which is permitted under the US law and allows a reduced punishment without a trial if the accused confesses to his or her crimes."
The article points out that Modi's position as a cricket official has been challenged in the Supreme Court by a man, Kishore Rungta, who lost when Modi was elected president of the Rajasthan Cricket Association. The petitioner has pleaded that rules do not permit anyone convicted of a criminal offence to hold the post of an office-bearer.
Modi's appointment as Vice President of the BCCI was also challenged in 2007 in the Bombay High Court on the same grounds - that he had been convicted of drug trafficking in the US in 1980. Though the High Court had dismissed the petition, it had come down hard on Modi and the BCCI saying it was not proper for the "BCCI to become a tool of musclemen, merchants and power brokers."
The board, the court had said, should not become a centre of power politics and internal politics was destroying the gentleman's game.
The court even asked the BCCI if it could find no one else to be the BCCI Vice President?