Rajasthan Kingpin bookie along with two others land in Mohali police net for the fraudulent telecast of matches

Rajasthan Kingpin bookie along with two others land in Mohali police net for the fraudulent telecast of matches

Harshabab Sidhu
Nabaz-e-Punjab, Mohali, July 6:
The district police today arrested kingpin Ravinder Dandiwal, who is allegedly involved in the international match-fixing scandal, along with two other accused for recently hosting fake Sri Lankan T20 league games in village Swara in the district.
The arrested accused are Ravinder Dandiwal, a resident of Hanumangarh district in Rajasthan and was currently staying in Phase 3B1 here, Pankaj Kumar Arora and Rajesh Garg alias Raju Kalia, both residents of Peer Muchalla here.
The police have also recovered two laptops and nine mobile phones from the possession of Pankaj and Raju, who were arrested on July 2. Their interrogation led to the arrest of Dandiwal today.
The trio including kingpin Ravinder Dandiwal was produced in a local court that sent him to five-day police remand while the remand of Pankaj and Raju has been extended by two more days.
Mohali SSP Kuldeep Singh Chahal said Dandiwal, who is on the radar of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), is facing charges of hosting a cricket match of the UVA T20 league on June 29 that was aired in Sri Lanka through YouTube and other web applications. He said the anti-corruption unit of the BCCI will be arrived in the city tomorrow to share details and interrogate Dandiwal.
SSP added that the cricket match, comprising small-time players largely of Punjab, Haryana and Chandigarh, was played at a cricket academy in Sawara village located about 15 km from Chandigarh. The players were seen wearing face masks, pretending to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, and were donning numbered jerseys.
During the interrogation of the accused, it was revealed by them that they booked the ground of stoker cricket academy in swara village from June 29 to July 5 for Rs 33,000 and formed 4 teams for organising a cricket series named UVA-T20-Premier League. The said league was held in swara village but was shown as being held in Sri Lanka and relayed on various social media apps such as fancode APP, Diamond, Sky, Lotus, Tenbet, Spin, Punjab Exchange, for the purpose of earning huge amounts of money through betting.
He said they were probing Dandiwal’s role in this racket. It was also discovered that the accused had brought hi-tech cameras from a Delhi-based team for covering the matches. The jerseys of the players were ordered online from Jalandhar, said the police.
“All the players hired for the cricket match were offered Rs5,000 to Rs10,000 for playing a match. The role of some Ranji Trophy players in hosting the match is also under investigation,” said a senior police officer.
He said the players with dark tan skins were selected for the match so that they looked alike Sri Lankans. Two cameras were installed in such a way they focused on the back of the players in order to conceal their faces and were typically taking long shots.
“When the match was airing, suddenly a camera captured some farmers working in a rice field. That raised a suspicion that the match is not being played in a stadium,” said the police official, who is part of the investigation.
During the questioning of Dandiwal, it was also established that the bookie had been involved in large scandals and had organised various tournaments in Sri Lanka, Australia and Dubai in which various known players took part. Dandiwal had also formed a club in 2009 named ‘Cricket Council of India (CCI)’ under which various cricket matches were organised in Mohali, Amritsar and Bhopal added the police.