A day ahead of the 89th annual general meeting of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), members played a friendly match at the refurbished Sardar Patel Stadium at Motera, near Ahmedabad.

Members engaged in banter as president Sourav Ganguly’s XI took on secretary Jay Shah’s team, which included among others former India captain and Hyderabad Cricket Association president Mohammad Azharuddin. That mood is expected to prevail when they sit down to discuss business on Thursday noon.

Whispers about Sourav’s brand endorsements and alleged conflict of interest are unlikely to come up at the AGM with several members convinced that there’s no such case against the president.

According to the BCCI constitution, conflict of interest is applicable, “when the individual enters into endorsement contracts or other professional engagements with third parties, the discharge of which would compromise with the individual’s primary obligation to the game or allow for a perception that the purity of the game stands compromised”.

The constitution cites another example. “When the individual has a direct or indirect independent commercial engagement with a vendor or service provider in the past, which is now to be engaged by or on behalf of the BCCI, its member, the IPL or the franchisee.”

The conflict issue has been making news since Dream11 became the title sponsors of the IPL. Sourav is one of the brand ambassadors of My11Circle, the direct competitors of Dream11.

The BCCI president endorsing a rival edu-tech brand, Classplus, has also raised eyebrows since Byju’s became the official team sponsors of the national team.

“Where is the conflict?” a senior BCCI member told The Telegraph. “If you are the BCCI president, it doesn’t mean that you cannot earn your bread and butter. He too needs to raise his income through various means, which includes endorsing brands.

“Let’s accept one fact... Here you have a president who is a brand in itself. He is the only one who attained the chair with significant star value. So people will relish talking behind his back,” the member said.

“A conflict arises when a person benefits financially or otherwise from an association. Say for example, you influence a marketing deal or selection or sponsorship by virtue of holding a position in the BCCI.

“You can never say that Sourav endorsing My11Circle is in conflict with Board’s sponsor Dream11 because Sourav got it in his individual capacity in April 2019, much before the Board’s contract happened. More importantly, he isn’t endorsing My11Circle at a BCCI event,” said another member.

“The logic is simple. A player may endorse Nike even if BCCI’s sponsor is Adidas. In this case, Adidas will get endorsement from that player only when he is playing for India and not when he is moving around as an individual. The same applies to the BCCI president as well,” said a member from South Zone.

To put the record straight, Sourav had stepped down from the mentor’s role of the JSW group co-owned Delhi Capitals before becoming the BCCI president.

As for those raising moral issues, the court has ruled that “fantasy sports possess an element of skill that predominantly affects the outcome of the games and, as such, are not gambling activities but are games of skill”.

Among other things, the IPL will dominate the agenda with the tournament to expand to 10 teams from 2022. In that case, the next edition will be limited to eight teams.

The BCCI will also have a new vice-president in Rajiv Shukla, the unanimous choice.