Former Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) chairman Najam Sethi has claimed that he rescued the sinking ship that board was fast becoming by generating profits worth 800 million rupees during his tenure.

Sethi, who stepped down from his post last week as the board prepares for fresh elections on August 18 to elect a new chief, said the amount was the highest pretax profits since 2011 against budgeted deficit of 366 million rupees for this fiscal year that ended June 2014.

"I was aghast at the continuing budget deficit eating into our revenues," PTI quoted Sethi as saying.

"I have emphasised on increasing investment income as compared to previous year and budget and in a complete stopover of massive capital expenditure that was originally budgeted for two billion rupees has been reduced to 196 million rupees and this as saved millions for PCB and greatly contributed towards enhanced liquidity of PCB," he added.

According to Sethi, when he first took charge the chief financial officer of the PCB warned him of a possibility of the board going bankrupt unless decisive measures were taken.

Sethi said the cleanup first started at home and there was a 12 percent reduction in administrative costs in his tenure compared to previous year.

"This entails mainly reduction of staff, elimination of unnecessary travel, elimination of unnecessary advertisement and promo expenses."

"Till I remained chairman I took no salary from the board. I just took some allowance for my car and that too I have returned to the board," he said.

Sethi, who is now on the governing board of the PCB, said 657 million rupees were budgeted for matches at neutral venues but actual expenses were 500 million, leading to a reduction of 24 percent while there was also a reduction of 17 percent in expenses on tours outside Pakistan.

He also took a shot at his predecessors, the previous two PCB bosses.

"PCB was in the dumps when I came along. Fellow ICC administrators used to joke about some of our ex-chairmen. One was alleged to fall asleep during meetings. Another wasn’t able to understand the fine print or argue in English. And so on. The constant ins and outs of the Chairman were terribly unsettling for them. Thank God all that is behind us now."

"I survived the snake pit and put PCB on the rails again!"

Sethi also threw his weight behind former PCB chairman diplomat Shahryar Khan in the upcoming elections.

"I hope ex-Foreign Secretary and ex-Chairman PCB, Mr. Shahryar Khan, is elected as the next Chairman. With his vast cricket and diplomatic experience, he will be an asset to PCB like he was as a member of the Management Committee of the last year or so," he told cricket website pakpassion.net.