Spot fixing: Supreme Court refuses to ban IPL matches

The Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected a PIL seeking a stay on all remaining matches of the Indian Premier League (IPL) in view of the spot-fixing scandal.

The apex court, however, has asked the anti-corruption unit of the BCCI to submit its report on this matter within 15 days.

A bench of justices B S Chauhan and Deepak Misra rejected the PIL, which also sought setting up of a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to look into the issues of match fixing and other alleged irregularities in the IPL.

The petition by Lucknow resident Sudarsh Awasthi had made all IPL franchises and BCCI party in the case along with the Centre.

"There are many irregularities in the IPL beginning from auction of players. Black money and money from anti-social elements are involved in the IPL which needs to be probed," the petition submitted.

Earlier, the BCCI has decided to appoint anti-corruption officer with each of the IPL franchises along with a security officer to monitor the movement of players.

Talking to reporters in Chennai on Sunday, BCCI chief N. Srinivasan said the board has appointed its anti-corruption chief Ravi Sawani as the Commissioner of Enquiry and he has been asked to file an internal inquiry report soon to enable the board to reach a decision on the issue.

He, however, admitted that the BCCI's anti corruption units have limitations and is handicapped to take action against the bookies.

He also said that the entire IPL cannot be seen in bad light due to the actions of the three arrested players.

So far, 18 people have been arrested for alleged spot-fixing in the latest edition of the IPL. Prominent among them are Rajasthan Royals players S Sreesanth, Ajit Chandila and Ankeet Chavan.