The Justice Mukul Mudgal committee will probe the IPL spot-fixing and betting scandal after the Supreme Court on Tuesday asked it to conduct a further inquiry against N Srinivasan and 12 others, including prominent cricketers.
The court virtually rejected the three-member probe panel proposed by the Board of Cricket Control in India (BCCI) citing conflict of interest in the choice of members.
A bench headed by Justice AK Patnaik said the Mudgal committee would be given assistance by investigating agencies if it agreed to conduct a further probe against 13 people who were named by it in a sealed envelope after it conducted an initial investigation into the scandal.?
BCCI informed the court that it had decided to constitute a three-member panel to further probe the scandal, but the bench said it would pass the order after hearing all parties and after considering the Mudgal panel’s reply.?
The fresh panel proposed by BCCI included former India captain and commentator Ravi Shastri, former Calcutta High Court judge JN Patel and former CBI director RK Raghavan.?
The court had earlier directed BCCI to suggest the names of persons who would conduct a “fair probe” into the scam.?
Senior counsel Abhishek Singhvi, on behalf of the Bihar cricket body, had pointed out that Shastri had a contract with the BCCI for commentary for IPL7 matches while BCCI interim president Shivlal Yadav and Patel are relatives and Raghavan is an affiliated member of the Tamil Nadu Cricket Association, whose president is Srinivasan.?
Petitioner Aditya Verma of the unrecognised Cricket Association of Bihar objected to the proposed panel and asked for a probe by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
However, the court had last week expressed reservations over an SIT or CBI probe, saying the institutional autonomy of the board had to be maintained and a committee constituted by BCCI to look into the issue would be preferred. “Having come to know the nature of the allegations, we cannot close our eyes,” the bench said, adding that it was concerned about the game of cricket in the country and not about individuals.?
The court allowed the BCCI and Srinivasan to hear portions of the audio recordings of the Mudgal panel’s proceedings, with the caveat that they don’t make any revelation. Further, it asked the committee to submit the recordings before the apex court’s secretary general.?
