The Indian Premier League (IPL) was thrown into disarray after a Supreme Court-appointed committee said the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Rajasthan Royals (RR) franchise holders should be suspended for two years because the owners indulged in illegal betting activities. It also said that Gurunath Meiyappan of CSK and Raj Kundra of RR should be banned from any association with the sport for life.
The report raises the possibility of India's glitzy cricket tournament, never far from controversy in its eight years of existence, having to go into Season 9 with just six teams -hardly a viable prospect. But others pointed out that this also offers the opportunity for a cleansing of the system, the introduction of new teams, and star players such as Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Ravindra Jadeja and Dwayne Smith coming up for auction next year, earlier than expected.
Officials of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), which runs the IPL, pointed out that the tournament can have as many as 10 teams. Another official said the two franchisees could appeal against the decision.
The Lodha committee was set up in January by the Supreme Court to arrive at punishments for Meiyappan, Kundra and their teams. This followed the report submitted by the Mukul Mudgal committee that investigated the 2013 spot fixing scandal.
Jagmohan Dalmiya, who heads he sport's administrative body, said it will examine the report.
The betting and spot fixing scandal broke at the end of the 2013 edition with Delhi Police arresting three players --S Sreesanth, Ashok Chandila and Ankeet Chavan. Later, Meiyappan was arrested along with Bollywood actor Vindu Dara Singh for heir alleged involvement in betting and spot fixing. The latter refers to betting on a specific development in a game rather than the overall outcome. The BCCI, among the richest sporting bodies in the world, has been battling allegations that it ignored glaring conflicts of interest related to the IPL. Its former president N Srinivasan runs India Cements, which owns the CSK franchise. Meiyappan is his son-in-law.
Srinivasan, now chairman of the International Cricket Council, was cited by television channels as saying that he had nothing to do with CSK any more. India Cements transferred CSK to a new subsidiary in February.
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