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Alleged bookie’s presence with Dhoni, Yuvraj and Tendulkar raises dust

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W ith alleged bookie Karan Gilhotra said to have socialised with the likes of Yuvraj Singh, M.S. Dhoni and Sachin Tendulkar, the situation surrounding the Indian cricket board is getting murkier and the question is being asked whether the International Cricket Council (ICC) will pull up these players too for their closeness to such an individual.

The war between the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and the N. Srinivasan-led ICC became murkier after ICC shot off a letter to BCCI president Jagmohan Dalmiya touching on board secretary Anurag Thakur’s presence with Gilhotra.

Thakur, a politician-turned administrator, has said that he knew Gilhotra due to his political activities in Punjab and not for his activities as a bookie. Interestingly, Gilhotra in a picture taken with Dhoni is wearing a card with an IPL logo on it. The picture was taken when Gilhotra had gone to attend IPL matches in South Africa in 2009.

Gilhotra has defended wearing the IPL tag saying it was given to him. “I feel that they [ICC] should have investigated the matter properly before coming out and calling me an ‘unverified suspected bookie’,” he said.

Indian newspapers have launched an extensive investigation into the Ghil hotra’s past and present and found that he owns a Honda dealership. It seems the ICC’s Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) in May last year had described Gilhotra as a “person of not good repute” who was strongly rumoured to be involved in “heavy betting” on cricket. The ACU had also alerted all the IPL team owners about Gilhotra.

Accusation

Gilhotra has hit out, saying: “It is nothing but an attempt to malign the reputation of Thakur, owing to internal politics. If ICC has put me on the watch list please also share the evidence.”

Thakur says that Srinivasan hasn’t reconciled with his election as BCCI secretary and is thus trying to malign him in public. His contention is that if Srinivasan had shared the list of suspected bookies, he would have kept away from such people.

Srinivasan himself is under fire for devaluing India Cements owned CSK franchise and for alleged spying attempts on BCCI members. Efforts are also now on by the BCCI to end Srinivasan’s role as chairman of ICC.