Dubai: As the story of Sreesanth and his two Rajasthan Royals teammates’ arrest on alleged charges of spot-fixing spread like a wildfire during the day, one could not help having a sense of deja vu. Cricket’s tryst with match-fixing, which shook the world with Hansie Cronje’s ‘confession’ in almost a Catholic spirit in 2000, expressed itself in another avatar with the latest disclosure.
The shots of a pensive Cronje deposing before the King’s Commission, Mohammad Azharuddin facing up to hordes of mediamen after his life ban or the trio of Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir walking away from Southwark Crown Court roll past in a flashback as a reminder to the body blows that the game took over the last decade and-a-half. While such incidents in the international arena had steeled the resolve of the International Cricket Council (ICC) to try and weed out corruption, the Indian Premier League (IPL) has emerged as a Frankestein’s ghost on which the game’s governing body have no control.
It was only last year — with the IPL V very much at it’s business end — when a sting operation by an Indian TV Channel nailed five players for the same offence as Sreesanth & Co. The Indian cricket board had done the damage control on that occasion by slapping the players with varying degrees of bans, but the also-rans like a T. Sudhindra or a Shalabh Srivastava were no patch on a big fish like Sreesanth which the Delhi Police have netted this time.
The presence of Sreesanth among the offenders have surely forced the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) to tread more carefully this time, suspending them from the IPL and promising “full cooperation” to the probe. The Delhi police commissioner Neeraj Kumar, who had been under fire lately for the rising sexual crimes against women in the Indian capital, chose to leverage the occasion to score the brownie points.
According to Kumar, Sreesanth tucked a towel in his waistband to signal to the bookie, giving him enough time to indulge in heavy betting. “Sreesanth bowled the first over without the towel. In the second over, he put a towel in his trousers and then, in order to give bookies time to indulge in betting, he did some warming up, some stretching exercises, and then went on to give 13 runs,” Kumar said.
The incident also shook up the unflappable N. Srinivasan, the BCCI president and owner of Chennai Super Kings. Speaking from the cooler climes of Kodai Canal in a video conference call with the media, he was candid enough to admit that after last year’s example, the handsomely paid cricketers would not dare to do such a thing. “I don’t know about others but I am shocked, the BCCI never expected it. It was a bolt from the blue. We will see whatever is there to be done is done. The sport is clean, we are running it clean and one or two bad eggs cannot sully the game,” the industrial baron.
Point taken, but the ambience in which the IPL is run — a heady mix of Bollywood, the notorious after-parties which sees a free-for-all for the unwanted elements — is but a soft target for the age old nexus between the bookmakers and the underworld in the game. The BCCI top brass headed by Srinivasan, which promised to clean up the IPL and let cricket take top priority over it’s trimmings after the exit of Lalit Modi, are still guilty of perpetrating the same crime.
“I am completely shocked. The IPL rewards cricketers quite handsomely, some of them are paid over handsomely. Despite that, some players are tempted to take the wrong route is shocking. Having said that, we need to wait for the investigations. You are innocent until you proven guilty,” said Sunil Gavaskar as the cricket fraternity rose as one to express shock.
Former India captain Sourav Ganguly was more forthright: “This type of corruption is up to the player, no one can force you. The deed is done by the player, no one can force him,” said Ganguly.
“I am very upset with Sreesanth. This is a complete loss of a talent. I am really feeling sorry for Rahul Dravid.”
Former India cricketer Kirti Azad, a staunch anti-IPL person, compared the incident with the one involving Pakistan cricketers Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir.
“At this point, I remember the England case. The Pakistanis were given harsh penalties. Here the BCCI [Indian cricket board] should not take care of the matter on their own. It should be handled by the police. And if found guilty, those involved should be given a life ban,” said Azad.
Former India wicketkeeper Syed Kirmani said: “Yet another black day for Indian cricket. You are cheating yourself, your country. It is totally unacceptable.”
— With inputs from agencies
