Corruption in cricket gets judicial endorsement.
Gurunath Meiyappan of Chennai Super Kings and Raj Kundra of Rajasthan Royals banned for life
New Delhi : Something that has been known to every cricket fan has now become a judicial reality. A committee of three former Supreme Court judges — Justices R M Lodha, Ashok Bhan and R Raveendran — appointed by the Supreme Court has suspended two franchisees of the BCCI owned Indian Premier League for affecting the purity of the game and cheating the fans.
The judicial endorsement of corruption in cricket is marked by a life ban on two key persons — Gurunath Meiyappan of the franchisee Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Raj Kundra of the Rajasthan Royals — who have been banned for life for bringing the game into disrepute.
With the owners banned for life and the franchisees suspended for two years the future of several stars of IPL cricket like Mahinder Singh Dhoni, who captains CSK, and Rahul Dravid, who mentors RR, has come under a cloud. The Lodha committee’s ban orders do not include any players but as the two teams are out for at least two years the future of the top rung players for the next two IPL tournaments has been hit. They do have the option of playing for other teams but then with tough competition for spots in various teams the going will be harder for several players. The available bounty that runs into crores would also shrink.
Interestingly, while Lodha committee came hard on the two bettors and their franchisees, it spared the power behind the CSK throne — N Srinivasan, the chairman of the International Cricket Council who owns India Cements, the company that owns the CSK franchise. It is well-known that without his blessings Meiyappan, his son-in-law, would not be wielding that kind of authority and power.
The decisions of the Lodha Committee could in fact be a boon for the movers and shakers of the BCCI as this would present them an interesting choice — find two new owners for CSK or add two more teams. The first option seems impractical as the existing owners of the suspended franchisees CSK and RR have deep pockets to sustain the losses for the ban period, and would not like to sell their stake in this atmosphere of disgrace. The BCCI bosses, who actually run the IPL show via the governing council, would prefer the addition of two new teams like the Kochi Tuskers and Pune Warriors as this would ultimately mean a much bigger tournament in 2018.
The 11-member governing council headed by Rajiv Shukla, a Rajya Sabha MP from the Congress party, and which has Anurag Thakur, the BJP youth leader, as its convenor, is scheduled to meet on July 19 to take a call.
However, there have been reports that after this order, Srinivasan, who heads the ICC as the BCCI’s representative, may find it difficult to continue in that high profile assignment. But the international cricket czar has weathered tougher storms in the past, and without any direct verdict against him, he is also likely to get past the current developments.
Lodha panel’s observations
On Meiyappan
That he lost up to Rs 60 lakhs in bets shows that he engaged himself in heavy bets. It is his bad luck that he did not make money out of these bets. Any agony suffered by him because of media coverage or any hardship that may have been caused to him is too small in comparison to the huge injury he caused to the reputation and image of the game, IPL and BCCI. If the reputation and image of the sport are lost, what remains? Being 40 years of age, he is not young but middle-aged. It is difficult to accept that he has passion for the game..
On Kundra
Being UK citizen, he had heavy responsibility to ensure that his acts and actions were not in conflict with the laws of a foreign country. Betting is a crime punishable under the Indian Penal Code. Besides that, it is an offence, a corrupt practice under the BCCI’s rules regulations and codes. With so much of information available online, it is very difficult to accept that as a UK citizen, he believed betting to be legal in India. It is no secret that some of the players of the Rajasthan Royals of which he was the team official were found enmeshed in a web of match fixing. This is not unusual because when a part owner and team official indulges in corrupt practices, betting being such a practice, involves more than one person…
On RR
It is true that Mr Raj Kundra of Rajasthan Royals relinquished his shares somewhere in the month of March but it is too late. No urgent action was taken by the Jaipur franchise against Raj Kundra when his acts of betting became known. Once it is accepted that cricket is greater than individuals or a body of individuals, the financial loss caused to a few players and the franchises may not be a significant consideration while taking disciplinary action or for imposition of punishment for wrongdoing and iregularities.
On CSK
The plea made by India Cements regarding long history to contribution of cricket and cricketers cannot be accepted in view of the act of Gurunath Meiyappan, a team official of CSK who happened to be the son-in-law of Mr N Srinivasan, the MD of India Cements, the then BCCI president. Owing to it, the purity of the game has been affected and the contribution, if any made by the Chennai Super Kings franchise, has also been wasted because millions of people, the true lovers of the game, feel cheated. Moreover, disrepute has been brought to cricket, the BCCI and the IPL to such an extent that doubts abound in the public consciousness about whether the IPL games are clean or not.
