Betting gang got turf watered too much to slow it down: Police
Nayan Ramesh Shah, one of the three men arrested on Thursday from the Kanpur hotel where IPL teams Gujarat Lions and Delhi Daredevils were staying, is suspected of having got pitches tampered for the betting syndicate he was working for, according to police sources.
Majority of bets being placed through this syndicate was on whether the match would be high or low-scoring.
Shah, the sources said, told the police his job was to ensure the pitch prepared for the IPL match was on the slower side. Shah has been an U-17 and U-19 player.
Shah would ensure this with the help of ground staff, which has free access to the pitch and ground, he has told police during questioning.
Ramesh Kumar, a member of the ground staff at Kanpur’s Green Park ground, has reportedly been working for Shah in the last two years, the sources said. Kumar and Vikas Chauhan, hailing from Kanpur Dehat district, were also arrested on Thursday.
Police found during questioning that Kumar’s job was to do excess watering of the pitch before it was handed over to the match referee.
“Watering had to be done in a way that pitch remains damp till the first innings is over; the pitch is watered a minimum four times before the pitch gets under the control of the match referee,” said the sources.
Kumar was reportedly paid Rs 5000 each time he watered the pitch as per Shah’s instructions. If the curator asked him to water it for five minutes, Kumar reportedly would water it for more than 10 minutes.
Each time this process was done, Shah would send pictures of the pitch being watered to Bunty, a racket kingpin based in Ajmer.
Ramesh Kumar reportedly clicked and sent pictures of the pitch after it was watered for the last time to Shah.
Having been a cricketer, Shah then analysed the pitch and sent a message that the team batting first would not be able to score 200 or more runs.
“This syndicate works differently, it accepts bets largely on high or low scoring game patterns,” said the source.