BCCI prez gets clean chit in match fixing charge
New Delhi: BCCI President-in-exile N Srinivasan was on Monday indicted by a probe committee for not acting against an unnamed cricketer accused of misconduct while his son-in-law Gurunath Meiyappan and Raj Kundra were found guilty of betting that could leave their teams CSK and RR in trouble.
The Justice Mukul Mudgal Committee, also came out with a severe indictment of IPL CEO Sunder Raman who it said knew of a contact of a bookie and had contacted him eight times in one season but did nothing about it.
However, the three-member committee, appointed by the Supreme Court to probe match-fixing and betting allegations in IPL 6 season, cleared Srinivasan of the charges of match fixing and scuttling the investigation.
It confirmed Meiyappan was a team official (team principal) of Chennai Super Kings while Rajasthan Royals owner Kundra’s “infractions violated BCCI/IPL Anti Corruption Code”.
A provision in the IPL code of conduct says that any Franchise, Group Company or owner acts in any way which effects the reputation of the League or BCCI-IPL, the Franchise will be scrapped.
The Committee, headed by retired High Court Chief Justice Mukul Mudgal with Additional Solicitor General L Nageshwar Rao and senior advocate Nilay Dutta as members, held that Srinivasan’s son-in-law Gurunath Meiyappan was involved in betting but not in match fixing.
It also questioned why Rajasthan police stopped probe abruptly on Kundra for his betting activities after the case was transferred from Delhi police.
“This individual (Sunder Raman) admitted knowing the contact of the bookies but claimed to be unaware of his connection with betting activities.
“This individual also accepted that he had received information about individual 1 (Meiyappan) and individual 11 (Kundra) taking part in betting activities but was informed by the ICC-ACSU chief that this was not actionable information.
“This individual also accepted that this information was not conveyed to any other individual,” the Committee said.
While giving its findings on Srinivasan, the panel said “this individual is not involved with match fixing activity. This individual was not found to be involved in scuttling the investigations into match fixing.”
“This individual (Srinivasan) along with four other BCCI officials was aware of the violation of the Players Code of Conduct by individual 3, but no action was taken against individual 3 by any of the aforesaid officials who were aware of this infraction,” the report, which was supplied to the parties today, said.
The player was not named in the report. The findings on Meiyappan said “no material is available on record to show that this individual is involved in match fixing.”
“Thus the committee is of the view that due to the scientific evidence of voice matching and the testimony of security personnel recorded by the investigating team, the finding about the betting activities of individual 1 (Meiyappan) and the finding that he was a team official stand confirmed,” it said.
The report said investigations have confirmed that Meiyappan was a team official of a franchiseee and he was in close touch with individual 2 with whom he had frequently meetings in his hotel room.
The report, supplied to different parties in the case, only revealed the name of Meiyappan, Kundra, Raman and Srinivasan. Names of other persons including cricketers were not disclosed as the per the apex court order. (PTI)