PTI 
 
Kolkata, Mar 18: In a setback to former BCCI president Jagmohan Dalmiya, the Calcutta High Court on Friday directed him to reply to a show-cause notice issued by the board for alleged financial irregularities, while setting aside a stay granted to him by a lower court earlier.

A Division Bench comprising Justice Bhaskar Bhattacharya and Justice P N Sinha observed that the trial judge had acted illegally in granting the stay while setting aside the city civil court order of ad-interim injunction on the show-cause notice.

The court also observed that there was no want of authority on the part of BCCI to issue such show-cause to Dalmiya and the lower court should not have granted the stay as the allegation involved a large amount of money.

The Bench, however, granted seven more days to Dalmiya to respond to the February 27 show-cause notice since the former BCCI chief had approached the trial court on March eight, nine days after the show-cause was issued.

BCCI secretary Niranjan Shah had issued a show-cause to Dalmiya, asking him to explain why appropriate action should not be taken against him for alleged irregularities with regard to the financial transaction of PILCOM (Pakistan, India and Lanka Committee for World Cup 1996), which was headed by Dalmiya.

Dalmiya had been granted 15 days to answer the show-cause but the former BCCI president, whose group lost the control of BCCI to the Sharad Pawar-led group in November, last year, moved the City Civil Court on March 8 to obtain a stay order on the show-cause.