Cricket: Azharuddin faces ban for life

Former India skipper Mohammad Azharuddin faces a life ban from cricket after a shattering report accused him yesterday of taking money to fix matches.

The report, by India's Central Bureau of Investigation, said nine former skippers, including New Zealand's Martin Crowe, Brian Lara, of the West Indies, and England's Alec Stewart had been linked with bookmakers in different ways.

South African captain Hansie Cronje was sacked in May and handed a life ban last month after admitting match-fixing following a Delhi police investigation.

The findings of the CBI report hinged on the testimony of a prominent Delhi bookmaker, M.K. Gupta, who said he had paid several thousand dollars to Cronje to fix matches in the 1996-97 season.

The others named, mostly on Gupta's testimony, included former Pakistan skippers Salim Malik and Asif Iqbal, ex-Sri Lanka captains Arjuna Ranatunga and Aravinda de Silva, and Australian batsmen Mark Waugh and Dean Jones.

Stewart, one of England's most successful cricketers of recent years, was accused by Gupta of accepting $US7000 ($17,789) in exchange for information about pitch, weather and team composition in 1993.

Stewart, on tour with England in Pakistan, denied knowing, meeting or taking money from Gupta,

Gupta, who told the inquiry that both Stewart and Crowe refused to fix matches for him, said he paid $US40,000 to Lara to under-perform in two one-day matches when the West Indies toured India in 1994.

The record-breaking batsman, who is en route to Australia with his national side, said in a statement issued by the West Indies Cricket Board: "I categorically deny taking money from a bookmaker or anyone else to under-perform."

The CBI report said Gupta had stated that both Ranatunga and de Silva had fixed the Lucknow test in 1994 between India and Sri Lanka. Ranatunga has denied any dealings with a bookmaker and said he had never been offered a bribe. De Silva has yet to comment.

Most of the players were introduced to the bookmaker by former India allrounder Manoj Prabakhar, the 162-page CBI report quoted Gupta as saying.

According to the bookie, he paid Malik to fix a match in Delhi between the Wills Cup winners of Pakistan and India.

The report said Iqbal gave information to a Bombay bookmaker named as Anil Steel. Malik has already been banned for life.

Of the Australians named, Jones said it was well known he had been approached, but had refused to co-operate.

The report said Gupta offered Jones $US40,000 to provide him with details of Australian morale, team strategy and pitch conditions, but had been turned down.

Mark Waugh was fined in 1995 by the Australian Cricket Board for giving to a bookmaker information on the pitch. In the report, Gupta said he had paid Waugh $US20,000 for details of strategy, team composition, weather and the pitch. Waugh was unavailable for comment.

The report said serious cricket gambling and criminal activity associated with it had started with India's World Cup triumph in 1983 and had risen with the increase in live television coverage in the cricket-mad country.

The report exonerated former captain Kapil Dev, who quit as national coach after months of sometimes tearful denials of match-fixing accusations from Prabakhar.

"My mother is happy now and that makes me feel very good," Kapil said, but added: "Nobody can give me back those days when my entire family was traumatised."

But Azharuddin, so recently the darling of the Indian crowds for his stylish batting, was roundly condemned in the report.

"The evidence against Azharuddin ... clearly establishes the fact that he took money from bookies/punters to fix cricket matches and also the fact that the underworld had approached him to fix matches for them," the report said.

After the ICC's anti-corruption stand under which they now require players and officials to sign a declaration saying they have never received money for information, Azharuddin is unlikely to be allowed to continue in cricket.

And India's ruling cricket body, the BCCI , said any action would be taken under its code of conduct which prescribes a life ban for match-fixing.

The CBI report, which roundly criticised Indian cricket's ruling body the BCCI for a lack of action, said no criminal charges could be filed against those named "because of the nebulous position of the law in this regard," but Sports Minister Sukhdev Singh Dhindsa said he had sent the report to the law ministry for its views.

The Hindustan Times said: "Yet while the charges that the CBI has levelled against India's top cricketing icons may not stick in court, they will definitely be plastered on public memory,"

The CBI report said "it defied credulity" to believe the BCCI was oblivious to such "rampant match-fixing."

But BCCI honorary secretary Jaywant Lele said he doubted the report's conclusions, adding there might be one or two black sheep but it took 11 players to fix a match.



In London, the head of the International Cricket Council's anti-corruption body, Paul Condon, said would study the report over the next 24 hours.

And in Sydney, the new president of the International Cricket Council, Malcolm Gray, said he feared the worst may still be to come.

He said the report suggested the problem was worse than most people thought.

"I would think we're getting to the bottom of it now, but I can assure you that it is a lot deeper and has been a lot deeper and broader than anybody realised or expected," Gray said.

"It is another knock to cricket ... and I suspect in the future we might get hit with more bad news."

Gray would not comment on specific allegations, but said the claims had already damaged the game's battered reputation.

"Obviously it's terribly disappointing for everybody involved in cricket, although we all knew that the CBI, who we believe are doing a wonderful job, have been working on this for some time, so it wasn't unexpected."

The ICC announced yesterday that it was sending members of its anti-corruption unit to India to study the CBI's report.

- REUTERS