SC refuses to intervene in IPL scandal probe

The Supreme Court Thursday declined to interfere, for now, in the Delhi and Mumbai police investigations into allegations of betting and spot fixing in IPL-6 and asked a petitioner seeking a CBI probe to wait for the process to end.

The apex court bench of Justice Gyan Sudha Misra and Justice Madan B. Lokur asked the petitioner, Mumbai-based law lecturer Sharmila Ghuge, to wait and watch the ongoing investigation while posting the hearing for July 23.

Ghuge sought the handing over of investigation to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) as multiplicity of investigation could result in conflicting findings which could be taken advantage of by people in the realm of suspicion.

She urged the court to direct the CBI to investigate the "allegations of spot fixing, match fixing and betting pertaining to the cricket matches of IPL-6 or its earlier versions, unearth the huge racket committing such illegalities...."

The court said that it was not possible for them to monitor the investigation.

The judges told Ghuge to let the investigations get over and then file an affidavit pointing out gaps, if any, in the probe.

Ghuge's counsel Pankaj Kapoor told the court that investigations into the scandal by different state police could result in filing of different chargesheets before different courts.

He told the apex court that it would be prudent if the entire spot fixing scandal was investigated by the CBI in its totality.

The petition contended there were "greater chances that the wrong doers may take benefit of lacunae that are bound to creep in" when the same allegations are investigated by the multiple agencies resulting in filing of different chargesheets.