M A I N   N E W S

IPL mess: Former Ranji player, two bookies in police net
Tribune News Service

The three were arrested after their phones were put on surveillance by the police. Another suspect, Babu Rao Yadav, who had played for the Railways was absconding, he said.

The Delhi Police has asked hotels in Mumbai, Chandigarh, Kolkata and Hyderabad to provide CCTV footage to scan meetings of the three arrested cricketers, S Sreesanth, Chandila and Ankeet Chavan, with bookies. The police is also planning to seek permission for collecting voice samples of the players.

Sources said the Special Cell of the Delhi Police had registered a case of cheating and criminal conspiracy on the complaint filed by Inspector Badrish Dutt, who died under mysterious circumstances a day after filing it.

Dutt, an expert in intercepting calls, had tapped over 100 hours of telephonic conversations that led to unravelling of the scandal, sources said. "Match-fixers and bookies from Delhi, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Punjab and some players participating in the IPL tournament have joined together to indulge in spot and match-fixing," said the FIR.

The FIR said the Special Cell received information in the "third week of April that certain members of the underworld" were involved in "some sort of fixing" in the ongoing IPL with active participation of some unidentified conduits based in Delhi. The Delhi Police said the role of more fringe and former players acting as middle-men between bookies and current players was being probed. Different sets of bookies were also involved in spot- fixing in the current edition of the IPL and the police suspect that some matches in the previous edition were also spot-fixed. Police sources said Chandila was in touch with "four sets of bookies" and was "willing to be available for fixing matches". Though they did not confirm the role of players in other teams as they have "no definite proof", investigators did not rule out the possibility and said probe was "still on and open-ended".