Angry Kapil shrugs off 'clean chit'

Former Test star Kapil Dev Nikanj reacted with complete indifference to the news that he has not been named by the Central Bureau of Investigation in its 162-page report on match-fixing and bribery in cricket.

“Why should I feel delighted?," an angry Kapil asked. "First, the media tore all my clothes and ripped me apart, and now they are giving me a new kurta to wear and they expect me to feel delighted!

"The media should have known that I have played cricket for twenty years for the country, and have led the Indian cricket team in the 1983 World Cup which we won. But despite all that, when someone said that I had offered him money to under-perform in a particular match some years back, everyone believed him, not me. Is that fair?

"It makes no difference to me what the media writes about me now. When the charges were levelled against me, every single newspaper in the country carried my picture on the front page with the story. Today, I went through major national dailies to see if they had printed my picture on the front pages and carried the CBI report along with it. But not one paper obliged the readers with that kind of display,” Kapil Dev told rediff.com on Tuesday morning.

Kapil said that he had no plans to file defamation cases against those sections of the media that had levelled the allegations in the first place. "I just don't care anymore," Kapil said.

Sources within the Sports Ministry meanwhile indicate that the CBI report states that no real evidence was found to back up Manoj Prabhakar's charge against Kapil Dev. The report states that barring Ravi Shastri, none of the players, past and present, who were questioned confirmed Prabhakar's allegation that Kapil Dev had offered him money to under-perform in a match against Sri Lanka.

Shastri alone told the CBI that Prabhakar told him about the incident, three days after it happened. "I asked him to send his complaint in writing to the team management," Shastri told the CBI, adding that he did not know whether Prabhakar had followed up on the suggestion.

Under questioning, Prabhakar confirmed that Shastri had indeed advised him to report in writing to the team management. He, however, remained silent when asked whether he had in fact done so.

The agency also examined the circumstances behind the decision, during Kapil's tenure as coach, to not enforce a follow on against New Zealand in the Ahmedabad Test of 1999. What saved Kapil here was the fact that Sachin Tendulkar, who was questioned by two CBI officers in his residence in Mumbai, said that it was a decision of the team management to not enforce the follow-on.

Interestingly, the CBI in course of its probe discovered that some bookies new in advance that India would not enforce the follow on in that game. The CBI has concluded that the news of the team decision was leaked to the bookies by a senior player and former captain.

The CBI report is in actual fact an exhaustive transcription of the question and answer sessions with various people, followed by details of the CBI's own followup investigations, and conclusions therefrom.

One of the main links in the evidentiary chain is Mukesh Gupta, who was also one of the first non-cricketers to be named in the scandal. Those who came in late will recall that Hansie Cronje named Mukesh Gupta in his deposition before the King Commission, and added that it was Mohammad Azharuddin who introduced Gupta to Cronje.

Gupta was interrogated at length and, after some initial hesitation, "sang like a canary" according to a member of the investigating team.

Investigators said they found it almost impossible to pinpoint the first ever match to have been fixed. “We may be wrong," said a member of the CBI probe team, "but it seemed to us that the first match that was fixed was in 1978, when Asif Iqbal after winning the toss told Vishwanath that he had won the toss, and we believe this was done because a couple of prominent Mumbai bookies had invested heavily in the outcome of the toss."

The report, while naming the Mumbai-based Shobha Mehta as the kingpin of the betting racket in India, names the likes of Ratan and Mona Mehta, Anil Steel, Hans, Poley, Anand Saxena, Vinod Chembur, Pinky, Tinkoo and Babloo as other leading players.

The report gives numerous examples of money changing hands between bookies and players. Instances of bookies paying for overseas trips of various players, and picking up their hotel and shopping bills, have been documented.

Though the report has been submitted, Joint Director R N Sawani, who is in charge of the investigations, said that the case was far from closed.

"We will look at any and all fresh evidence as it appears," Sawani told rediff.com.

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