LAWSUIT FILED AGAINST USA CRICKET

Loading

Boulder, CO, March 28, 2021—Two members of the Board of Directors of USA Cricket, Venu Pisike and
Srini Salver, allege that its governing board has engaged in a series of acts that violate the organization’s
constitution, including an unlawful modification of the constitution and the improper appointment of
an “Independent Director.”

In delaying the 2020 Board member election, concealing the actual vote count on a resolution
changing election procedures, insisting on Mr. Paraag Marathe’s immediate appointment as
Independent Director (depriving a duly-elected Board the opportunity to make this appointment), and
obtaining a legal opinion letter intended to provide cover for these improper actions, among other
issues, the defendants in the lawsuit have sought to entrench the positions of certain officers and
directors of USA Cricket, rather than to give a voice to new members. It is this appearance of
impropriety that has stained USA Cricket in the past, and one that the Plaintiff Directors seek to
eradicate going forward.

The complaint, filed in Boulder County, Colorado, seeks to prevent USA Cricket from making
any improper modifications to the USA Cricket Constitution that change voting procedures and
requirements for its annual Board of Directors election. The complaint further seeks to require USA
Cricket to hold a lawful annual election immediately – such an election was supposed to be completed
before December 31st 2020 as per the Board’s resolution in Feb 21st, 2020 meeting but has yet to be
held. The complaint also seeks to delay appointment of an “Independent” member of the Board until
after the new Board has been sworn in, consistent with past practice.

In an appeal to public sentiment, USA Cricket falsely claims that the intent of the Plaintiffs is
to disenfranchise new voters But in delaying a lawful election, and improperly amending the
Constitution without the requisite supermajority vote necessary to do so, the defendants are seeking
to disenfranchise those 700+ members who were eligible to vote in the 2020 election.Mr. Pisike and
Mr. Salver raised these issues for several months before pursuing the current litigation. Their efforts
included the presentation of a legal opinion letter at a board meeting in November and the filing of a
prior lawsuit on January 8. The previous lawsuit was preliminarily dismissed at the request of USA
Cricket’s CEO, Iain Higgins, so that the parties could pursue an informal resolution of the dispute. Only
after negotiations among the various board members broke down in March did Mr. Salver and Mr.
Pisike feel that immediate action was necessary to ensure the integrity of the upcoming USA Cricket
board election.

The Plaintiff Directors have long sought to increase membership in USA Cricket – but not by
breaking the organization’s own governing rules. USA Cricket is now manipulating the Plaintiff Directors’

good faith efforts to resolve these issues out of court by making representations about the
election in its recruitment drive.

“This lawsuit is a last resort for me, but I want the members of USA Cricket to be able to have
confidence that the organization scrupulously and transparently adheres to its own rules, especially the
rules surrounding elections and membership,” said Venu Pisike, one of the plaintiffs in the suit. “I have
tried to raise these governance issues on a number of occasions, both formally and informally, to no
success.”

Moreover, USA Cricket’s March 19, 2021 statement regarding this litigation, which was neither
presented to nor approved by the Board of Directors prior to its issuance by Mr. Higgins, omits several
key allegations of the lawsuit regarding USA Cricket’s lack of transparency on this issue. Before the vote,
the Board intentionally did not disclose to the membership that they had sought advice from an
independent legal specialist on whether a simple majority was sufficient to approve Resolution 1 even
though the USA Cricket Constitution requires a 2/3 majority to change election procedures. And on
prior resolutions, USA Cricket has typically revealed the vote percentages for and against resolutions
that are presented to the members; this time, however, USA Cricket simply announced that the vote
had “passed” without actually revealing any for and against percentages.

In its recent statement, USA Cricket also does not reference the second issue raised in the
complaint, that being the immediate appointment of Paraag Marathe as an “Independent Director.” In
previous years, USA Cricket has waited until its elections have concluded to allow the incoming Board
of Directors to appoint the Independent Director. The lawsuit filed by Mr. Pisike and Mr. Salver seeks
to have Mr. Marathe’s appointment overturned until a new Board is seated, allowing the voting
membership to participate in the appointment of the Independent Director. Inexplicably, USA Cricket
refuses this request even as it claims that its intention is to enfranchise new voters and to give them
more representation on the Board.
“We filed this lawsuit in order to protect the development of cricket in the United States,” said
Srini Salver, the other Director Plaintiff. “If cricket is to become a mainstream sport, it is vitally
important that USA Cricket operates with the highest degree of integrity and ethics, and abide by its
Constitution.”

Related posts