Board of Control for Cricket in India vice-president Lalit Modi has made it a habit to lash out at the International Cricket Council every other day, but the governing body says it is not obligated to reply to his claims.

The ICC [Images] feels he is not qualified enough to make such statements, and doesn't have enough knowledge of administration or how the ICC works.

"We have heard a lot from Mr Modi. He is entitled to his opinions. What we are interested in is facts, and we must point out that there are several factual errors in Modi's piece.

"And what is even more interesting is that he has not attended any ICC meetings. He is not even a senior BCCI official; he has just completed one year as BCCI official and just two years with his state association [Rajasthan Cricket Association]. But he still thinks he is qualified enough to talk about ICC," ICC chief executive Malcolm Speed [Images] said in Chandigarh on Wednesday.

Speed said the ICC does not want to get into a war of words through the media and believes that all issues can be resolved through direct dialogue.

"ICC has said very little in this case. We have seen long articles, letters in newspapers. We have been accused of being the East India Company, but we have said very little about Modi's comments. We have deliberately said very little, since we are not interested in debating through the media. We are not interested in litigating the matter through the media," Speed asserted.

ICC president Percy Sonn added that they would not complain to BCCI president Sharad Pawar [Images] about Modi's comments.

"ICC doesn't lodge complaints with or against members. ICC runs cricket and is just interested in running the game. There is freedom of expression in India and people are free to say whatever they want. It will only respond to comments made in the newspapers when it's time to do so," Sonn said.

"We had very fruitful meetings with Sharad Pawar and the other members. The future looks very rosy. We can't respond to each and every allegation made by a person in the newspapers. We can't just stoop to such a low level," he added.

The ICC also believes that issues with the new Members Participation Agreement would be resolved soon. The BCCI is also at loggerheads with the ICC on the MPA (Members Participation Agreement), the ICC's mandatory agreement for participation in global events. It is the only country that has refused to sign the agreement.

"We had meetings in the past with the sub-committees of the BCCI regarding the issues of MPA. We have been briefed about the issues of BCCI and I must say they are not substantial issues. We will discuss the same at the ICC Board meeting on November 3rd and 4th in Mumbai and look to move forward," Speed said.

He said several countries had a problem with it, but all have agreed after some changes to the draft.

"Australia was the first to come forward with issues related to the MPA, which was followed by other countries like New Zealand [Images], West Indies [Images] and Pakistan. We worked on the agreement and then came up with a fresh draft. In September, all nine full member countries agreed to sign the revised MPA, but India refused to sign, saying some points had to be reviewed," Speed said.

"We accept BCCI's observations and some points will be reviewed and then the draft would again sent to all the members for their approval. It was disappointing that India didn't raise the issue in April. There is no deadline for the countries to sign the MPA, but we would like to get it done as soon as possible. There have already been five or six drafts of the agreement so far; it's not a big thing, as it happens all the time," he added.

The BCCI has also shown interest in bidding for ICC's marketing rights for the period 2007-2015. The ICC's current $550 million seven-year deal ends with next year's World Cup in the West Indies and world cricket's ruling body began negotiating new sponsorship until 2015 last month.

Asked whether a member could bid for the marketing rights, Speed said: "It will be put forward before the members at the Board meeting. Seven out of the 10 full members must vote for a resolution to pass. When the ICC takes a decision, it's not a decision taken by me or Sonn, 70 per cent of the members are with us. Even if four members are against the decision, then it is not approved."

Speed also believes that Indian cricket Board, despite being a powerful and rich body, would be judged by its success on the field and not off it.

"I have an old fashioned view about sport organizations. I do not judge on how much money they have in their bank accounts. I judge them on three things -- look at how their team performs on the field, how their stakeholders (associations) are looked after, how their resources, that is the population, is utilized.

"I am not being critical of India. But look at New Zealand, who have a population of 4 million and not much spending power, but they consistently perform well," he said.