News 30 June 2015

ICC says BCCI were passed Modi’s IPL corruption claims

The International Cricket Council (ICC) has said that its Anti-Corruption & Security Unit (ACSU) passed on allegations made by Lalit Modi (pictured) in 2013 alleging that a number of Indian Premier League (IPL) players had been involved in corruption. ‘The ICC confirms that Mr Modi’s confidential e-mail, which was received in June 2013, and which has recently been published on Twitter, was provided to the ACSU at the time’, read an ICC statement provided to AFP. ‘The ACSU handled that information in accordance with its standard operating procedures, which included sharing it with the BCCI’s anti-corruption unit’.

It is understood that the BCCI told the ICC that it would investigate the allegations. The 2013 letter from Modi to to ICC CEO Dave Richardson alleges that real estate businessman Baba Diwan paid money and bought apartments for Ravindra Jadeja, Dwane Bravo and Suresh Raina. ‘[Diwan] is also a big punter and also bookmaker’, reads the letter. ‘I had banned him from bidding for any IPL teams. He is further a close friend of Guru and Raj Kundra.’

Kundra was suspended by the BCCI in June 2013, shortly before Modi sent his letter expressing his concerns, over allegations that he has been involved in illegal betting. Gurunath Meiyappan, a ‘team official’ with Chennai Super Kings (CSK), was also implicated in the Justice Mudgal Committee report into allegations of illegal betting and spot-fixing in the IPL. All three named in Modi’s letter are CSK players.

CSK is owned by India Cements, which is owned by the family of former BCCI President N Srinivasan, who has recently taken over as ICC President. The Justice Mudgal Committee report found that Meiyappan, who is Srinivasan’s son in law, had bet on IPL games, however found no evidence that he had been involved in fixing games. On 22 January 2015, the Indian Supreme Court confirmed this finding.

A Delhi court yesterday deferred the framing of charges against 42 people in connection with the allegations made in the Justice Mudgal Committee report until 25 July. The report was commissioned in July 2013 after the BCCI charged three players with match-fixing in May 2013 – S. Sreesanth, Ajit Chandilia and Ankeet Chavan along with a former player turned bookie, Amit Singh. It found the BCCI’s sanctioning of these players to be ‘adequate and satisfactory’.

On 25 July, criminal charges against the three players and 39 others will be considered by the Supreme Court. Sreesanth and Chavan were given lifetime bans by the BCCI, while Chandilia’s case is pending. Modi was Chairman of the IPL until 2010, and is currently fighting a 2010 BCCI decision to expel him based on 22 charges involving breaches of its rules.

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