The module of owning KPL franchises need to be reexamined, asserts Ajit Singh
BCCI’s Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) chief Ajit Singh feels that there needs to be a complete reexamination of the ownership of franchises in state-run T20 leagues. However, he is against the idea of banning state-run leagues altogether in the attempt to wipe out the corruption in Indian cricket.
Recently, Karnataka police nabbed two first-class — Goa’s CM Gautam and Mizoram’s Abrar Qazi — for their role in fixing the KPL final between Bellary Tuskers and Hubli Tigers. The arrests were made after the match-fixing scandal in the Karnataka Premier League (KPL) came into light with the arrest of Ali Ashfaq Thara, the owner of the Belagavi Panthers franchise.
“These teams have been bought through open auction and they have not been auctioned by the BCCI but by the state association. I presume whoever was the highest bidder owned the franchises. So now whatever has been the module of owning these franchises need to be examined,” Singh told PTI.
“I am sure nobody amongst them (potential state league franchises) would be having a criminal record. Even if somebody has a criminal record, he may have a front person bidding for a team. That sort of thing doesn’t work. You have to have a very strong personal interaction with them and it has to be drilled regularly that there will be zero tolerance for corruption. Also, you can examine their financial records before allowing them to bid and even afterwards. I am not a finance expert, so somebody belonging to this field will be able to decide doables and non-doables. But some sort of monitoring is also required there,” he explained.
However, the former IPS officer is not keen to endorse the idea of banning state-run leagues altogether, as has been suggested by many around the cricketing fraternity.
“My opinion is that it's a call that the board has to take. When a person falls ill, you don’t kill the person, you try to cure him. We have already been investigating the KPL fixing case and we have been exchanging information with the police. We have been passing on whatever information we have,” he said.
Although he welcomes working in coordination with the police to nab people like Gautam, he firmly believes that a specific law with regards to sports fraud needs to be coined.
“There is a law in the Indian Penal Code and it depends on the circumstances of the case. They can register it as a case of cheating. Now it’s for them (police) to collect evidence of cheating. Obviously there is a party that has been cheated in this case,” he said.
How they go about it and how they collect it, its for them to decide. But as I said, there is no specific law regarding sports corruption. Many other countries have that. If that happens, then that’s going to make things easier,” Singh added.