USA Cricket to resume 2020 elections

USA Cricket announced the resumption of the 2020 elections after a lengthy delay. 

Five candidates will vie for Individual Director position, and four for the Club Director position, while Nadia Gruny is unopposed as the Female Player Director, and therefore shall serve another term in the seat.

According to the announcement, the election process will take place in 6 stages, and is currently in the first stage: 

• Stage 1: USA Cricket collects and collates preliminary voter lists for the Club Director and Individual Director positions
• Stage 2: USA Cricket publishes preliminary voter lists for peer review over a forthcoming two week period
• Stage 3:  NGC considers all officially received peer review feedback and publishes the final voter lists after an audit review by an independent audit firm
• Stage 4:  Candidates are given approximately three weeks for formal campaigning
• Stage 5:  Election voting period of two weeks is provided for voters to cast their ballots with an independent election provider
• Stage 6: Votes are independently tabulated, with audited results announced within a week of the completion of the elections.

Also according to the announcement, the entire process should conclude in March or April of 2022. 

Originally set by terms in the constitution to take place before November 30 of 2020, elections have been delayed since. Citing technology challenges with the membership portal, and in order to expand the voting base throughout the USA to more accurately resemble the national community, the board went beyond the November 30 deadline and passed a referendum to extend voting registration in December. Following the passage of that referendum, USA Cricket’s voting base expanded from 723 registered members to “roughly 20,000” registered members. 

In January of 2021, USA Cricket announced a new 2020 election timeline, set to be completed by March 31, 2021.

The election was delayed again when two protesting directors filed suit against five other directors in late March of 2021 claiming, among other accusations, unconstitutional election delays, and that the referendum was passed with less than the constitutionally defined supermajority of support. That lawsuit was dismissed by a Colorado District Court in July. 

In USA Cricket’s July announcement of the dismissal, USA Cricket stated that the board would “urgently consider and determine how best to address the delayed Board election, especially now that most of the technology challenges with the membership portal have been resolved and outstanding Membership Fees are in the process of being collected.”

The news follows USA Cricket’s announcement of the 2022 Membership Portal. 

The candidates for the 2020 election are: 

Individual Director

Anand Patel – Washington Cricket League 

Babu Venkatachalapathy – North Texas Cricket League

Ganesh Sanap – Northern California Cricket Association

Kuljit-Singh Nijjar – Dallas Cricket League

Suraj Viswanathan – Incumbent Individual Director

Club Director

Ajith Bhaskar – Incumbent Club Director

Atul Rai – Former USA Cricket Co-League Director who split his 2018 term with co-winner Sushil Nadkarne due to a tie in the vote.

Nikhil Deshpande – Washington Cricket League

Susheel Bhat – Michigan Cricket Association

Female Player Director Candidates

Nadia Gruny – Incumbent Female Player Director

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