From correspondents in West Bengal, India, 09:30 PM IST

Kolkata - The war between the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB) deepened further Monday when a board member said no decision was taken by its financial panel on withholding funds of the CAB.

Finance committee member Gautam Dasgupta said no decision was taken by the committee regarding withholding funds of CAB as mentioned in board secretary Niranjan Shah's missive to the state association and the actions undertaken were 'motivated and vindictive'.

In a letter to the CAB, Shah informed that the board decided to debit to the CAB Rs.400 million because its president Jagmohan Dalmiya failed to furnish details of the Account No 1223 with the Bhawanipur branch despite a notice being served to him April 15.

Shah said the board has no option but to 'regretfully endorse the finance committee's decision to withhold all subsidies to the CAB and debit the unexplained amount to the state association.

In a letter sent to Shah Monday, Dasgupta, a former joint-secretary of the BCCI, said: 'My attention was drawn to a letter...in which you have alleged that in the finance committee meeting of the board April 28 at Mumbai, a decision was taken to stop all subsidies and payments to CAB till the transaction details of CAB with the Indian Overseas Bank.'

'I had attended the meeting as one of its members and I am constrained to observe that no such decisions were taken,' he said.

'The truth is that no such decisions were taken by the committee and it appears to be an after-thought and vindictive motivated plan on the part of a few,' Dasgupta said in his strongly worded letter.

'While I reserve my rights to comment on the ostensible amount of Rs.40 crores (Rs.400 million), if any, I am at a loss to understand that if at all, such important decisions were taken as early as on April 28, why did it take the BCCI two months (June 29) to communicate such alleged vital decisions.'

(Staff Writer, © IANS)