The Supreme Court-appointed Justice Mukul Mudgal Committee, which investigated the allegations of spot fixing and betting in the 2013 edition of the Indian Premier League (IPL), has said that sidelined BCCI president N. Srinivasan's son-in-law Gurunath Meiyappan was involved in betting.
The report, however, gave a clean chit to Srinivasan on both counts of spot fixing and betting.
While exonerating Meiyappan of spot fixing charges, the committee said he was involved in betting. Meiyappan was marked as individual 1 in the report.
The committee, which marked Srinivasan as individual 13 in its report, said in its conclusions: "This individual (Srinivasan) is not involved with match fixing activity", and "This individual was not found to be involved in scuttling the investigations in match fixing".
However, the report said Srinivasan and the four officials of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) were aware of the violation of the Players' Code of Conduct by a player marked as individual 3 but they did not act against him.
"This individual (Srinivasan) along with four other BCCI officials was aware of the violation of the Players' Code of Conduct by individual 3, but no action was taken against individual 3 by any of the aforesaid officials who were aware of this infraction," the report said in its conclusion about Srinivasan.
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Dealing with IPL CEO Sunder Raman, who was marked as individual 12 in the report, the report said: "This individual also accepted that he had received information about individual 1 (Meiyappan) and individual 11 (Rajasthan Royals co-owner Raj Kundra) taking part in betting activities but was informed by the ICC-ACSU chief that this was not actionable information. This individual also accepted that this information was not conveyed to any other individual."
Ronnie Flanagan is the chief of the International Cricket Council's Anti Corruption and Security Unit.
About Sunder Raman, the report said: "This individual knew a contact of a bookie and had contacted him eight times in one season. This individual admitted knowing the contact of the bookies but, however, claimed to be unaware of his connection with betting activities."
The committee also said Kundra was in contact with bookies.
The committee, which marked Kundra as individual 11, said: "This individual was in touch with the bookies about betting and thus by not reporting contact with the bookies has violated BCCI/IPL Anti-Corruption Code."
The report further said: "The committee found that a friend of individual 11 (Kundra) was a known punter. The said punter has given a Section 164 (of Code of Criminal Procedure relating to recording of confessions and statements) statement to the effect that he was placing bets on behalf of individual 11. Individual 11 had introduced him (punter) to another bookie who dealt with larger stakes."
"Section 161 statement (Examination of witnesses by police under CrPC) made by another player confirmed that individual 11 introduced him to a bookie. Materials in record indicates that individual 11 was placing bets or was at the minimum standing guarantee for the punter friend. These infractions violate BCCI/IPL Anti-Corruption Code," the report said about the conduct of Kundra.
In an obvious pointer to the role of people beyond the cricketing world and bookies, the report about Kundra said: "The committee also found that the investigation against this individual was abruptly and without reason stopped by the Rajasthan Police upon receiving the case paper from Delhi Police."
Regarding Meiyappan, the committee in its conclusion said: "Investigations have confirmed that this individual was a team official of a franchise. He was frequently meeting individual 2 in his hotel room. This strengthens the conclusion of the committee in its report dated Feb 10, 2014 that individual 1 (Meiyappan) was in close touch with individual 2."
"The forensic report of the voice sample analysis further confirms the voice of this individual in the conversation with the person acting as a go between, between this individual and bookies.
"Consequently, the divergent in the two reports dated Feb 8 and 9 about the voice sample belonging to this individual 1 gets resolved and the report thus becomes unanimous about the betting activity of this individual."
The report concluded that the committee was "of the view that due to the scientific evidence of voice matching and the testimony of security personnel recorded by the investigating team, the finding about the betting activities of individual 1 and the finding that he was team official stand confirmed."