Justice Mukul Mudgal committee, appointed by the Supreme Court to investigate the IPL fixing scandal, has cleared BCCI president-in-exile N Srinivasan on charges of match fixing and trying to scuttle the probe against him.
However the panel told the Supreme Court that Srinivasan, along with four other BCCI officials, "was aware of violation of players code of conduct by individual 3 (a player whose name is not disclosed) but no action was taken againt individual 3 by any of the foresaid officials who were aware of this interaction."
The panel concluded that Srinivasan's son-in-law Meiyappan was indeed an official of the Chennai Super Kings, and that there was evidence that he was involved in illegal betting, but not in match fixing. "He was frequently meeting individual 2 (not named) in a hotel. This strengthens the conclusions of the committe in its report dated Feb 10, 2014 that individual 1 (Meiyappan) was in close touch with individual 2," the report said.
"Forensic reports of voice sample analysis further confirm voice of this individual (Meiyappan) in the conversation with the person acting as a go-between, between this indivdual and bookies. Consequently, the divuglence in two reports dated February 8, 2014 and February 9, 2014 about voice sample belonging to this individual (Meiyappan) gets resolved and the report thus becomes unanimous about betting activity of this individual," the report added
Rajasthan Royals co-owner Raj Kundra too was found to be in touch with bookies and taking bets in violation of the BCCI's anti-corruption code and that the probe against him was abruptly and without reason stopped by the Rajasthan police upon receiving papers from Delhi police.
"The committe found that a friend of individual 11 (Kundra) was a known punter. The said punter has given a statement before a magistrate that he was placing bets on behalf of Kundra...Materials on record indicate that individual 11(Kundra) was placing bets or was at the minimum standing guarantee for his punter friend. These infractions also violate the IPL anti-corruption code," the report said.
Also in the dock is IPL chief operating officer Sundar Raman, who the panel said knew the contact of a bookie, and had contacted him 8 times in one season.
"This individual admitted knowing the contact of the bookies but however claimed to be unaware of the connection with betting activities. This individual also accepted that he had received information about Individual 1 (Meiyappan) and Individual 11 (Kundra) taking part in betting activities but was informed by the ICC anti-corruption chief that this was not actionable information. This individual also accepted that this information was not conveyed to any other individual, the report said.
