It is a good place, then, to find some perspective.

Arun Singh Dhumal is in his office at the stadium, and he is in no hurry.

He leans back, he smiles often, he pauses before answering in the way that people do when they have actually thought about something rather than just rehearsed a line.

He is the chairman of the Indian Premier League, the second most valuable sports league in the world, a tournament whose two franchise sales in a single March week, Royal Challengers Bengaluru at $1.78 billion and Rajasthan Royals at $1.63 billion, made front pages well beyond the sports desk.

He is also the younger brother of Anurag Thakur, the former BCCI president and Union Cabinet minister, and the son of Prem Kumar Dhumal, twice Chief Minister of Himachal Pradesh.

Cricket and politics and administration are, for him, not separate worlds.

They are simply the air he has breathed since boyhood.

He grew up in Jalandhar, at a school that produced half the Punjab Ranji Trophy team.

His cousins played Duleep Trophy and Ranji Trophy cricket.

His brother Anurag played India Under-15 and Under-19.

Arun captained the cricket team at his engineering college and played for his university.

The path into administration came later, circuitously, as these things often do, through eligibility rules and Supreme Court orders and the particular accidents of timing that shape careers.