Mumbai, Oct 4 (PTI): Lawyer-turned-administrator Shashank Manohar was today elected unopposed as the BCCI President ushering in a new era in the Cricket Board and ending N Srinivasan's clout in the cash-rich body.

Manohar took over the post at the Board's Special General meeting which lasted less than half an hour here. He was the only candidate left in the fray for the election in which the deadline for filing nomination ended last evening.

The election was necessitated by the sudden demise of Jagmohan Dalmiya, who had a short term of seven months after his election in March this year. Dalmiya was made the interim President when Srinivasan "stepped aside" in the wake of revelations that his son-in-law was involved in betting during the 2013 IPL season.

All the six units of East Zone unanimously proposed Manohar's candidature for the president's post, reflecting Srinivasan's diminishing hold in Board's power politics.
A BCCI by-election needs only one proposer from the zone which is electing the president and it was the East's turn this time. Manohar got the nod from all the six associations and was the lone nomination at the end of the 7 pm deadline yesterday.

Interestingly, one of the proposers for Manohar was Dalmiya's son Avishek, who was representing his familyclub National Cricket Club (NCC) in the SGM.

Srinivasan skipped the meeting and the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association was represented by P S Raman.

The others who also proposed Manohar's name were Sourav Ganguly from Bengal, Sourav Dasgupta from Tripura, Gautam Roy from Assam, Ashirbad Behera of Odisha and Sanjay Singh of Jharkhand State Cricket Association (JSCA).

Manohar's earlier stint was for three years between 2008 -09 and 2010-11.
His anointment also means that Srinivasan now has little chance of coming back into the BCCI fold till 2017 when the Vidarbha man's tenure ends.

Manohar has the responsibility to guide the BCCI to its stable self after a troubled era under Srinivasan whose tenure was marred by acrimony within and outside the Board's portals.

The 2013 IPL spot fixing scandal that singed Srinivasan, following his son-in-law and IPL team Chennai Super Kings' former principal Gurunath Meiyappan being found guilty of betting on the T20 League games, led to the Supreme Court sidelining him from holding the reins of the BCCI.

Srinivasan had tried his best to muster enough support for his nominee to take control of the BCCI, including having a surprise meeting with another interested person, Sharad Pawar, at Nagpur recently.

But Pawar's group members were not keen to have any truck with the TN strongman - who has decided to keep away from the whole rigmarole.

And with another group led by Anurag Thakur also backing Manohar's candidature after his meeting with Union Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in Delhi last week, the road was clear for Manohar.

Manohar, thus, is the biggest beneficiary of the change made in the BCCI's statutes a few years ago permitting former office-bearers to return to power after finishing their terms.