Spot-fixing: Cops to seek further remand of IPL trio today
21 May 2013
The last round of questioning of three Indian Premier League cricket players - S Sreesanth, Ajit Chandila and Ankeet Chavan - is taking place today before they are produced in a Delhi court.
The five-day police custody of the three arrested cricketers and 11 bookies who were also arrested last week ended on Tuesday. Police said they will ask for further custody of the three cricketers and seven of the 11 bookies.
Baburao Yadav, the former Ranji Trophy cricketer detained on Monday, has also been formally arrested and is likely to be produced in court along with the IPL cricketers.
Meanwhile, the Chennai Police have arrested one more bookie, identified as Prashant, in connection with the IPL spot-fixing scandal. The police say they have recovered Rs4 lakh cash from him.
Law minister Kapil Sibal has said there should be a law to make fixing a criminal offence.
Even as the lawyer for former test cricketer Sreesanth prepares to file for bail, the case against him and Ajit Chandila has tightened with developments in the probe by the Delhi and the Mumbai police.
On Monday, Delhi police recovered Rs20 lakh from the house of Ajit Chandila's relative. Chandila accompanied the raiding team and pointed out the cash kept in his kit.
In Mumbai, police recovered pictures of Sreesanth with known bookie 'Jupiter' and evidence of several deleted email conversations believed to be between the arrested conduit Jiju Janardhan and Sreesanth.
The analysis of Sreesanth's laptop has also revealed his interactions with a casting director, who had mailed him several pictures of models, as well as a folder containing numbers with code names to each. The police also now have evidence that Sreesanth sent a car to get a person picked from the international airport, believed to be Jupiter.
The Mumbai Police also established key links of arrested bookies with Pakistan based operatives. At least 30 such Pakistani links have been established so far.
The questioning of alleged ring leader Ramesh Vyas has now led to the identification of at least 15 more bookies, who are now being hunted.
The Board for Control of Cricket in India formally joined the probe as its anti-corruption wing chief Ravi Sawani met Delhi Police chief Neeraj Kumar.
"We are conducting a separate probe. Rajasthan Royals is the most affected team and they have sent a complaint to the police, which will be a part of their FIR (first information report)," Sawani said.