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| May 1, 2000 | ||
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Between March 1 and April 18, Ajay Sharma ran up a bill of nearly Rs 12,000 on his cell phone, making over 500 calls. Some of the numbers he called belonged to well-known bookies in the Alipur Road, Rajpur Road, Vasant Vihar, Geetanjali, Barakhamba Road, South Extension and Jama Masjid areas of Delhi. His most regular interlocutor, however, was Mohammed Azharuddin (see box), whom he called religiously before every Test match or one-day international, doing so even when the former Indian captain went to Sharjah for the Coca-Cola Cup.
Of course, there is the chance that Sharma was only wishing an old friend best of luck before each game -- but somehow the police don't think so. Rather, they suspect Sharma was relaying messages from bookies to Azharuddin. It seems this was a role he was used to performing. It appears to have brought him financial benefit. Former teammates remember the early Sharma as a "boy of modest means, from an ordinary family". As a deputy manager at CWC, he "should be bringing home about Rs 20,000". Yet, he owns at least two flats -- in Delhi's Vasant Kunj and Rohini areas -- and drives Astras and Lancers. Admittedly, some of the money can be explained from his earnings in the Minor Counties circuit in England. He also owns a firm called Target Sports International, now being investigated to find out whether it was a front operation. Even so, a DDCA official tentatively admits, "Haan, his lifestyle is probably not commensurate with his known sources of income." The Delhi Police couldn't agree more.
Says S. Venugopal, manager, purchase and publicity, CWC, "He's proceeded on leave for 133 days but we don't know where he's gone." That last bit is important because Sharma was overheard telling a colleague he was "going to England" -- but doesn't seem to have taken his employer's mandatory permission before going abroad. Cricket circles in
Delhi are understandably cagey. Sunil Dev, DDCA secretary, says, "Azhar
and he are very, very thick pals. They may have been helping each other as
cricketers and as friends. Beyond that I know nothing." Who are the guilty Indians and what does it mean? "Two hundred
times Prabhakar has said he has the names. Two hundred times you have
given him headlines. But he still has not named anyone." Evidence against the Azharuddin-Sharma nexus is unproven and circumstantial. Mumbai Police may be sitting on something stronger: a taped conversation between bookies who sought to bribe five Indian cricketers to throw away a match against New Zealand in the 1995-1996 season. Apparently, Azharuddin, Ajay Jadeja, Nayan Mongia, B.V. Venkatesh Prasad and Manoj Prabhakar were offered Rs 20 lakh each. Some of the cricketers are suspected to have said yes. In the conversation, one bookie asked if Sachin Tendulkar had been roped in. "He would make 50 (runs) for sure," came the answer. The players who accepted the bribe asked the bookies to put their money on New Zealand and ending up taking home an additional Rs 25 lakh as gambling earnings. The mention of Prabhakar's name may seem surprising given he blew the whistle on the scandal in the first place. Sources now suggest that was because of a "falling out with old friends like Azhar". On his part, Latif claims to have received a lecture on match-fixing from Prabhakar -- "he is not entirely clean" -- during Pakistan's tour of New Zealand in 1994. He also trains his guns on Tendulkar, asking what "a bookie called Shobhan, aka Vicky was doing on Sachin's very select wedding-guest list". In the Mumbai Police, there are whispers of how Dawood Ibrahim's agents Sharad Shetty (aka Anna) and Chhota Shakeel, run the fixing business and have a number of Mumbai resident cricketers on the take. The wickets are wicked. India's stumped, So how will the truth be caught? Cricket has faced crisis before but rarely been viewed as seedy. Now there is a smell to the game that usually arrives from an open sewer. But India cannot afford to close its nose and walk on, like much of South Africa is doing. As Peter Robinson of The Daily Telegraph wrote, many of the letters to the South African newspapers were from "the white Christian right arguing that Cronje was guilty of little more than an error of judgement". No doubt many of them used the same argument for their silence over apartheid. India must recognise that it is largely responsible for cricket's decay -- the bookies, the money, the betting and subsequently player involvement, all begins here -- and therefore must set an example by cleaning house effectively. It must not be hasty though, like the woolly idea of nationalising cricket. The government's kiss of death to other sports is renowned, and as Dalmiya says, "If you think cricket should be finished then go ahead (with such an idea)." A more widely acceptable solution would be a CBI-led investigation, which would sift for a watching public the honest from the damned. Going through bank statements and tax files could be embarrassing, even an invasion of privacy, but the silence in the cricketing fraternity has not been an encouraging sign. As former coach Anshuman Gaekwad, who banned mobile phones the day he took over, says, "You've got to keep the investigation going and go into detail, else they die a natural death without any result." He believes the guilty must be banned, as does Kapil who says, "If heads must roll, they must roll." The soporific BCCI has also joined in belatedly with a planned code of conduct, where a player's refusal to report an approach by a bookie (to him or a fellow player) could lead to his suspension. Everyone in Indian cricket swears they have the good of the game at heart. It's becoming harder to believe. The game requires a restoration of its innocence, and if a few idols are demolished in the process, then so be it. -with Waheed Khan in Karachi
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