Match fixing is IPL's underbelly

While the three players arrested on Thursday will be the fall guys, betting and match fixing will continue to flourish

It should not come as a surprise if just before a match, one gets the odds for and against any IPL matches through text messages or Blackberry messaging system. Betting on cricket matches is an age old business in Mumbai – flourishing with the help of underworld and law enforcement agencies.

Most of the betting – which is illegal in India – takes place in Mumbai and in Gujarat area. Thousands of crores of money changes hands during the cricketing season and very rarely bookies are caught by the police.

What is interesting is that three years after the public spat between the then IPL commissioner Lalit Modi and Congress minister Shashi Tharoor, the betting controversy has hit the headlines again.

At that time, serious allegations of fraud, betting on matches and money laundering allegations, income tax fraud were leveled against IPL team owners including against Modi but the law enforcement agencies have failed to convict a single person till date.

In 2010, the CBI in fact had taped conversations between top IPL officials and book makers on the rigging of the matches but nothing came out of the entire scandal. There are records with the Reserve Bank of India and enforcement directorate of money laundering, use of Mauritius route to invest in cricket teams and illegal fund transfer to foreign companies. The international tax department of income tax department sent notices to many companies including to IMG. We hung out around IT, ED offices to get more information about the IPL controversy. And we were rewarded with exclusives with documentary evidence.

Insiders say after the initial hue and cry, law enforcement agencies lost interest in the case due to pressure from the higher ups. In 2010, the CBI and enforcement directorate had filed a case against Lalit Modi, Rajasthan Royals team owners, Punjab and Kolkata Knight Riders teams. But till date not a single case has reached the trial stage.

The income tax department, which was investigating the cases against various team owners including Shah Rukh Khan, for tax fraud went to sleep.

The question to ask now is what happened to the cases filed earlier in 2010?  Were all the allegations wrong? If the allegations were not right then why the law enforcement agencies went on an overdrive to kill the reputation of film stars and of the team owners?

This means two things: Either our law enforcement agencies are too incompetent to take the case to the conviction stage or they are under pressure of money or big wigs to go slow. Either way, it’s the game which is a loser.

My view in the present case is that these three players arrested on Thursday will be the fall guys. They will lose their career and rest will go on as usual. The betting and match fixing will flourish, as usual.