Delhi police investigations into the high-profile IPL-6 “fixing” case have established that underworld don Dawood Ibrahim is the “fountainhead of betting and spot-fixing in India”. This is precisely what the police is likely to state in a exhaustive 6,000-page chargesheet that is likely to be filed in a city court on Tuesday.
The police is also likely to state that Dawood’s close associate, Chhota Shakeel, also played an active role in the betting syndicate, sources said. It is for this reason that the Delhi police plans to book three Rajasthan Royals players — S. Sreesanth, Ankeet Chavan and Ajit Chandila — under stringent provisions of the Maharashtra Control of Organised Crime Act. In addition, over 30 persons are likely to be named as accused under MCOCA and various IPC sections. Those likely to be named include bookies Ramesh Vyas and Tinku Mandi, former Ranji Trophy player Babu Rao, Sreesanth’s close aide Jiju Janardhan and Mohammed Yahya, who was picked up as he was fleeing to Dubai. The Delhi police special cell, which is investigating the case, feels it has made out a foolproof case against the accused and during the trial will be able to successfully link Dawood and the underworld with the spot-fixing racket. The special cell has also managed to intercept a call between Dawood and his Dubai-based associate Javed Chautani talking about betting.
Just a day after the BCCI’s inquiry panel report gave a clean chit to IPL owners in spot-fixing, the cricket board came under scathing criticism for not taking police inputs before completing its “hasty” investigation, also prompting fresh calls for the cash-rich BCCI to be brought under the Right to Information act.
The Union sports ministry said it does not give much importance to the BCCI’s internal probe report, and will wait for the police investigation to get over.
The BCCI panel, through its hasty probe, tried to clear the way for president-in-exile N. Srinivasan to return quickly to the board’s top post as it claimed to find no evidence against his team, Chennai Super Kings, or its owner, India Cements.
The two-member panel, comprising former Madras high court judges T. Jayaram Chouta and R. Balasubramanian, submitted its report to the BCCI working committee which met in Kolkata on Sunday.
The two former judges also found no evidence of any wrongdoing against Raj Kundra and Rajasthan Royals.
The BCCI has come under severe criticism for not waiting for the police reports before completing its probe on spot-fixing and betting, which rocked IPL-6.
“Why was there such a haste to complete the investigation? The BCCI should have waited for other investigative bodies to give their inputs,” said Y.P. Singh, a former police officer-turned-advocate.
BCCI vice-president Niranjan Shah said the BCCI could not depend on the police report as the two-member commission was already on the job.
“I think we can’t depend on the police report as we already constituted a commission, and whatever the commission said is final,” Mr Shah said.
He reiterated that the two-member panel had to work with whatever “available material” it had.