M A I N   N E W S

Prabhakar gives tapes to CBI

NEW DELHI, June 3 (PTI) — Former cricket all-rounder Manoj Prabhakar today submitted to CBI video tapes of his conversation with other cricket players and board officials, secretly filmed by him on the subject of match-fixing.

“I have submitted most of the cassettes to the agency and it is for them to probe further into the scandal which has earned a bad name to the game of cricket,” Prabhakar told reporters after meeting the CBI officials.

Prabhakar, who had made allegations about match-fixing in 1997, arrived at the CBI headquarters in the afternoon and submitted the video tapes to the officials of Special Crime Branch of the premier investigating agency.

Before entering the CBI headquarters, he said: “I have come to finish the task I have been assigned.”

Asked whether he was facing any pressures not to pursue the case, Prabhakar said: “Pressures are there but I and my friends (pointing to Tejpal) are determined to bring the case to its logical conclusion.”

Prabhakar, who was with the CBI officials for nearly an hour, said the CBI had told him that after going through the tapes they would decide about the future course of action.

He ducked all questions from the media on whether he was facing any threat and said: “I do not want to comment on this issue now.”

Asked about the charges made by former cricketer Prashant Vadiya and other officials that the secret video recording was an act of betrayal by Prabhakar and that the tapes were “doctored”, Prabhakar, who appeared before the agency for the second time, said: “These statements hardly matter...When they spoke to me they did so straight from their heart.”

Asked why he was favouring a particular website rather than be open to the media in general, he said: “These people have suffered because of me...they had to leave their weekly magazine under different circumstances... I have to help them.” The former all-rounder said he would be submitting the remaining portions of the tapes very soon to the agency.

Earlier, Prabhakar had met the CBI officials on May 24 and made his submissions for about 90 minutes before two officials of the agency about his charge.

The CBI has so far examined seven persons including former cricket board chief I.S. Bindra and Delhi District Cricket Association’s sports secretary Sunil Dev, former Indian cricket team manager Ajit Wadekar and cricketer-turned commentator Navjot Singh Sidhu and scores of bookies in Mumbai, the agency sources said.

The investigating agency has asked Mr Bindra, who submitted a personal report running into 360 pages on May 15 about the selection procedure for the Indian cricket team, whether the board had any system of checks to find if any match had been fixed, the sources said.