The Central Information Commission has ruled that the Board of Control for Cricket in India does not qualify as a “public authority” under the Right to Information Act, effectively keeping the world’s richest cricket board beyond the reach of transparency laws that apply to government bodies.
The order, passed by Information Commissioner P R Ramesh, reverses a 2018 ruling by then-commissioner M Sridhar Acharyulu, who had held that the BCCI was a public authority and directed it to set up mechanisms for receiving RTI applications. The BCCI challenged that order in the Madras High Court, which sent the matter back to the CIC for a fresh look in September 2025. The fresh look has now gone in the BCCI’s favour.
The Commission found that the BCCI is a private society registered under Tamil Nadu law, not created by Parliament or any state legislature, and not subject to government control in any meaningful way. The government plays no role in appointing its office-bearers or running its affairs. The fact that the BCCI enjoys certain tax exemptions, the Commission said, does not amount to the government substantially financing it – a key threshold under the RTI Act.
“Tax exemptions or statutory concessions available generally under law cannot be treated as substantial financing by the government within the meaning of the RTI Act,” the order noted. The Commission relied on three Supreme Court judgments in arriving at its conclusion – Thalappalam Service Cooperative Bank v State of Kerala, Zee Telefilms v Union of India, and Dalco Engineering v Satish Prabhakar Padhye – holding that the BCCI did not satisfy the statutory requirements under Section 2(h) of the RTI Act.
Significantly, the Commission also clarified that the Supreme Court’s 2016 judgment in BCCI v Cricket Association of Bihar – often cited by those arguing for greater accountability – had emphasised governance reforms but had not declared the BCCI a public authority under the RTI Act. The Lodha Committee and Law Commission recommendations on transparency, it added, were advisory in nature and could not override the express language of the statute.
The BCCI’s revenues – from IPL media rights, international broadcasting deals, sponsorships and its share of ICC distributions – run into tens of thousands of crores. The Commission noted that this financial independence, rooted in market forces rather than state support, places it outside the framework the RTI Act was designed to cover.
In its closing observations, the Commission went further, cautioning against the assumption that government oversight automatically produces fairness. “Fairness is not an inevitable byproduct of control,” it observed. “It is contingent upon transparency, accountability, and the careful calibration of regulatory mechanisms to the specific domain.” Superimposing a model of oversight built for government bodies onto a market-driven entity like the BCCI, it said, could produce unintended consequences in “a finely balanced economic structure.”
The RTI application that triggered this case had originally been filed with the Ministry of Youth Affairs and Sports. The Ministry told the Commission it did not have the information sought and could not transfer the application to the BCCI since the board had not been declared a public authority. The appeal was accordingly dismissed.
