IPL Spot Fixing Scandal: Gurunath Meiyappan Keeps His Appointment With Mumbai Police!

Gurunath With MS Dhoni

Mumbai Police today rejected Gurunath Meiyappan’s request for an extension to appear for questioning. ‘He has to appear by 5pm today or else he will be declared a fugitive’, said a determined Mumbai Police. Big Money and Big Connections did not work for him this time. Gurunath decided to take a private plane to Mumbai and he arrived in Mumbai this evening, though a little late. At the moment he is being grilled by top cops.

Just before deciding to fly to Mumbai Gurunath reportedly met his father-in-law or the BCCI President or the CSK franchise owner or the Managing Director of India Cements that officially owns CSK. Whatever form of N Srinivasan he met things did indeed start to happen. Betting is illegal in India except for on the racecourses. Even inside a racecourse a steward and his/her relatives are not allowed to bet, because they are endowed with a lot of inside information. Therefore, even if N Srinivasan was interested in drawing a line between betting and match or session or spot fixing he or his relatives are never allowed to bet on matches, because being an insider or franchise owner or franchise official they have access to a lot of information. This creates a situation of conflict of interest even if you consider betting not as an offense. And based on this, his CSK that won the IPL three times and is to play the final this year too runs a high risk of being eliminated from the IPL. So a few things needed to happen!

India Cementsdisowns Gurunath instantly saying in a statement that he is neither the CSK owner nor CEO nor the Principal, and in actuality only a member of the team management. Poor Gurunath then reportedly changes his net profiles seemingly in an obsessed self-demotion drive. If Mumbai Police finally arrests Gurunath for passing crucial match information to Vindoo Dara Singh who passes it on to the bookies, it would be very interesting to see what N Srinivasan does or what happens to CSK. Maintaining his silence since the conflict of interest N Srinivasan is already under tremendous pressure to resign.

As anticipated, custody of Vindoo Dara Singh gets extended to 28^th May in a local court in Mumbai today. More arrests are likely both by Delhi and Mumbai police. Another bookie was arrested in Hyderabad today.

In the meantime crowds are still thronging the stadiums to watch the last qualifiers and the eliminators before the final. You see, they are cricket freaks, and only genuine cricket lovers are devastated by the fixing eliminators before the grand finale which they fervently expect to be in their interest. Or maybe the hapless crowds did not want to lose the money on their pre-booked tickets. How could they expect to get a refund from a defunct system?  

IPL Spot Fixing Scandal: Now The Umbilical…Sorry…The Umpiring Connection!

Whenever India does anything importantly right or wrong the Pakistan connection has to come up sooner or later. People of both countries like it or not. The Karachi based Don Dawood Ibrahim’s D-Company connection to the Indian Cricket betting racket was already established in the raging IPL Spot Fixing Scandal that grows sleazier every minute now. The unholy mix of cricketers, bookies, middlemen, BCCI and IPL franchisee officials, Bollywood stars and dons now proudly includes that of umpires too. So far the umpires have not been blamed for anything seriously harming the game except for some wrong or lousy decisions on the field. But now, Pakistan umpire Asad Rauf gets implicated thanks to arrested Bollywood actor Vindoo Dara Singh spilling the beans.

Asad Rauf has been on the elite umpiring panel of the International Cricket Council (ICC) since 2006 and was getting ready for duty in the forthcoming Championship Trophy in June. Although not exactly an umpiring blemishe, Rauf has had a scandalous controversy involving a Mumbai model in 2012. He came under the scanner of Mumbai Police after Vindoo revealed his connection to the bookies in terms of providing crucial match information from the field. This is one of the biggest blows this IPL scandal has delivered so far to cricket in India and now to Pakistan cricket lovers too.

The ICC, following the developments, promptly withdrew Asad Rauf from the elite panel thus canceling his engagements in the Champions Trophy. The ICC feels that this decision has been taken in best interests of Rauf as well as of sports.

Meanwhile, a Mumbai Police team today landed in Chennai on the trail of Gurunath Meiyappn, the son-in-law of the BCCI Chief cum CSK owner N Srinivasan and CEO of CSK franchise, following leads from Vindoo Dara Singh. Unbelievable as it seems, the police team struggled to get entry into Gurunath’s residence. Finally, he could not be traced and there was no response from him or from the BCCI Chief. Exasperated, Mumbai Police served a summons to him to appear by 5pm tomorrow for questioning. As par latest reports Gurunath has requested Mumbai Police to allow him to appear on Monday.

Now, what happens to the inquiry committee appointed by the BCCI to look into the matter of spot fixing? Would the committee be so powerful as to dare question its Chief? Silence prevails on all powerful fronts—the BCCI President is silent, the topmost cricketers are silent and all the political leaders irrespective of their parties are silent. This silence is that of big money, clout and vested interests. BCCI silent for reasons known to all, top cricketers silent for the stakes and political parties always sink their differences when it come to a common ground like big-money cricket. Therefore, in this respect how far the police investigations are going to be effective? Let us keep on hoping that Big Money is finally defeated and cricket cleaned forever. Three bookies were arrested in Mumbai today and several in Kolkata and other places making the total arrests  so far more than fifty.

IPL Spot Fixing Scandal: Trail Leads To The Top!

The IPL Spot Fixing Scandal has been throwing up more and more sinister skeletons out of all its cupboards. The putrid journey into the vast and endless terrain of sordid details of bookie connections, underworld connections, Bollywood connections and top cricketing involvement is only speeding up. Police interrogation of the Bollywood actor Vindoo Dara Singh, arrested yesterday for his involvement with top bookies, reveals that Vindoo was in constant touch with Gurunath, the son-in-law of the BCCI boss and owner of the IPL franchise Chennai Super Kings (CSK). This leads the racket right up to the top level of BCCI itself. Interestingly, Vindoo was a close friend of the wife of Mahendra Singh Dhoni--the Indian Captain and Captain of CSK--as stadium and party photographs amply demonstrate. This spells big trouble for BCCI and this may also indicate why the Board was not interested in tough action. You may ask--was that emergency meet of the Board addressed by the President or the owner of CSK? 

The buck does not stop here either. Although the Delhi High Court rejected the petition seeking a ban on IPL saying that the Supreme Court had already ruled in that issue, the court agreed to hear a revised petition seeking a direction to the Indian Government to take over control of IPL and segregate BCCI from IPL. The crucial hearing is scheduled on 23rd August, 2013. Another public petition was filed in the Madras High Court demanding that Indian Government take over Indian Cricket management and bar the BCCI from using 'Indian Cricket Team' for its team. The petition also sought a CBI probe into the spot fixing scam. The Court heard this petition and issued notices to  the Government of India, BCCI and the IPL Commissioner asking them to respond within two weeks. 

The trail also leads to widespread speculation about a few names of Bollywood superstars and former top cricketers likely to come up in due course. The connection of Don Dawood Ibrahim of the D-Company in cricket match or session or spot fixing has already been established thanks to statements made by his brother Iqbal Kaskar who has been in the custody of Mumbai Police since 2003. Big money and the clout thus created win always in India. Let Big Money be defeated this time. Let the investigations not fall short of cleansing Indian Cricket, permanently and irrevocably.