Like many others before him, N. Srinivasan is cut down to size by a ruthless cricket board he once lorded over

If radio waves could tell the story of the Board of Control for Cricket in India's (BCCI) latest administrative crisis, the blips on the radar would map out a series of frenetic phone calls from Chennai to Kolkata in the first week of April. If they could measure the tone and tenor of these conversations, they would reveal intense agitation as International Cricket Council (ICC) Chairman Narayanaswami Srinivasan grew increasingly frustrated at not getting his way on the selection of committee members and the cancellation of the Bangladesh tour in June, allegedly threatening the board's President, Jagmohan Dalmiya, with instant impeachment if he didn't comply. And then, a loud final bleep, caused by an infuriated call from Kolkata to Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in Washington would explain the sudden flat-lining of Srinivasan's life as world cricket's undisputed lord and master.

The rise and fall of Srinivasan, 70, will perhaps be remembered as cricket's most compelling narrative over a decade when the game transformed from a serious sport that generated bountiful revenues to a Twenty20 circus that made more money than anyone could ever imagine. Srinivasan's story would arguably beat anything that happened on the field, including India winning the World Cup at home in 2011, and maybe even edge out the sordidly dramatic saga of his friend-turned-foe Lalit Modi, who has been in self-imposed exile in England for the last five years. Modi, the larger-than-life creator of the IPL, was a maverick who thought he had become bigger than the system, only to be cut down by a board that takes no prisoners-just like Dalmiya in 2005 and Srinivasan now. For the BCCI is a poisoned chalice. What it giveth, it taketh away.