Supreme Court dumps BCCI’s 3-member panel to probe IPL fixing

New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Tuesday rejected the BCCI’s three proposed names to constitute a panel that would investigate allegations of involvement in the IPL spot fixing and betting scam against the Board’s in exile chief N. Srinivasan and 12 others, including prominent cricketers.The apex court asked the Justice Mudgal Committee, which had conducted a preliminary inquiry into the scam and had submitted a report before the court, if it was willing to conduct further probe into the scandal.

A bench headed by Justice A.K. Patnaik said the committee would be given assistance by investigating agencies if it agreed to conduct a further probe against the 13, who were named in a confidential report after it conducted initial investigation into the scam.The court, however, said that on the BCCI’s decision to constitute a three-member panel to further probe the scandal, it would pass an order after hearing all the parties and after considering Justice Mukul Mudgal committee’s reply.

The BCCI working committee had in its emergent meeting on April 20 decided to suggest the names of former India all-rounder Ravi Shastri, former Calcutta high court Chief Justice J.N. Patel and ex CBI director R.K. Raghavan as members of the committee.The bench also allowed Srinivasan and the BCCI to hear some portions of the Mudgal Committee’s interactions with Srinivasan, India and Chennai Super Kings captain M.S. Dhoni and Chief Operating Officer of IPL, Sundar Raman. It asked the probe committee to provide audio recordings to the Supreme Court’s secretary general who will make arrangements for BCCI and Srinivasan’s counsel to hear the tapes in the apex court.

The court asked the Board and Srinivasan to maintain complete confidentiality of the contents of the audio tapes and not to leak it to anybody. “Any content of the audio recordings going out means cricket would be blackened in the country,” the bench said. The audio recordings will be heard in the presence of the secretary general by advocate Amit Sibal on behalf of Srinivasan and advocate Rohini Musa on behalf of the Board.

The apex court had on April 16 expressed reservations over a SIT or a CBI probe, saying that institutional autonomy of the Board has to be maintained and a committee constituted by the BCCI to look into the issue would be preferred. The court had said that it cannot “close its eyes” to the allegations made by its probe committee in the scandal and an investigation must be conducted to clear the air as some prominent players were named in the report submitted in a sealed envelope.