Strong Anti-Corruption Law Needed To Curb Match Fixing

As one who has always felt strongly that those involved in match-fixing in this country get away lightly thanks to lax and outdated laws, I read with great interest the views expressed by the former Delhi Police Commissioner Neeraj Kumar in an interview a few days ago.

Kumar is convinced that an Anti-corruption law in sport is needed to curb the nefarious practice. He believes that the government can earn a lot of goodwill by passing the Anti-corruption Bill in Parliament.

"If we have that law the scenario will change completely, people will not go scot-free. It's a low hanging fruit, I don't know why they are not doing it," he said.

Kumar, a celebrated IPS officer who served for 37 years, was in charge of Delhi Police when its Special Cell under his guidance in 2013 arrested S. Sreesanth and fellow Rajasthan Royals cricketers Ajit Chandila and Ankit Chavan on spot-fixing charges.

However, in 2019, the Supreme Court, despite ruling that there was evidence against the former India player, asked BCCI to reconsider the life ban on him. The punishment was eventually reduced to a seven-year suspension that ended in September, 2020.

According to Kumar, stakeholders have shown a distinct lack of seriousness in bringing a law against corruption in Indian sport, which is why someone as tainted as Sreesanth got away despite strong evidence of spot fixing against him in the 2013 IPL.

Kumar is convinced that Sreesanth escaped because of a vacuum in the law. “He got a reprieve from the Kerala HC but it has not said he is innocent’’ Kumar said.

“The case seemingly didn't go anywhere as unfortunately, there is no law in India to deal with corruption in sports," he said adding, "Even a country like Zimbabwe has a specific law. Australia and New Zealand too have it. In Europe, there is a law because corruption is there not just in cricket but in football, tennis, golf.”

Kumar was also associated with the Hansie Cronje match-fixing scandal in 2000 as part of CBI's investigating team. According to him the biggest roadblock in prosecuting corruption in sports is the absence of a law. “So many things that we do given the present situation cannot stand the test of judicial scrutiny,’’ he said.

In India, a law to curb malice has been in the works since 2013. The Prevention of Sporting Fraud Bill (2013), which was tabled in Lok Sabha in 2018, had a provision for five-year imprisonment and a fine of Rs 10 lakh for those found guilty of sporting fraud, including fixing. The bill was drafted by Justice (retd) Mukul Mudgal and was seen as a game-changer to curb match-fixing.

Kumar said the court praised the work done by the Police. “The judge said the special cell has done excellent work to expose this racket, but in the absence or vacuum of law, I am not in a position to hold any of them guilty and sentence them. These were his exact words,’’he said.

Kumar has also written a book 'A Cop in Cricket' about his experiences handling corruption in the sport. He is hopeful that the matter, which has been opened again in the Delhi HC will reach its logical conclusion.

He feels that the case against former India skipper Mohammed Azharuddin, who was implicated in the 2000 scandal wasn't allowed to be completed. “If the Azharuddin case would have been allowed to reach its logical conclusion, some big names would have been exposed but that was also not allowed.

“Somewhere there is a lack of seriousness in dealing with corruption in sport, particularly cricket. Big names did come to light but they were put in a sealed envelope and it still remains sealed in the Supreme Court,” Kumar said, referring to the names that Justice Mudgal's committee submitted to the apex court.

Kumar also had an opportunity to work as the chief of BCCI's Anti-Corruption Unit (ACU) for close to four years and he didn't find the world's richest Board sincere in dealing with corruption. “They were indifferent to the whole matter of corruption and they didn't give me the necessary resources," he said.

The BCCI provided Kumar only two people for assistance and yet, he said, they managed to clamp down on private leagues which were hot-beds of corruption.

it was doubly interesting to go through Kumar’s interview because a couple of years ago Steve Richardson, the coordinator of investigations at the ICC’s anti-corruption unit (ACU) and Ajit Singh the head of the BCCI’s ACU had both advocated a similar hardline approach to deal with the menace of match and spot fixing.

While Richardson was of the strong belief that making match-fixing a criminal offence will be the “single most effective thing’’ for sport in India, Singh even as he concurred with this view added that India needs a “very strong law’’ against betting which is the source of corruption in cricket in India.

This warning came after Sri Lanka became the first major cricket playing country in South Asia to criminalise match-fixing with punishments including a ten-year prison sentence after investigations that found several Lankan cricketers guilty of breaching the corruption code.

At the moment with no legislation in place the Indian police with whom the ACU is working with in a bid to curb corruption are operating with one hand tied behind their back. That is why Richardson felt that legislation to make match-fixing a criminal offence would be a game-changer.

“We have currently just under 50 investigations and the majority of these have links to corruptors in India. It would be the single most effective thing to happen in terms of protecting sport if India introduces the legislation,’’ he said.

Richardson was convinced that more than the players, the law would deter the corruptors. He was frank enough to state that he could actually deliver to the Indian police at least eight names of people who are serial offenders, constantly approaching players to try and get them to fix matches.

But because of the lack of legislative framework in India there is little the police can do. “To that extent they have my great sympathy because they try as hard as they can to make the existing legislation work but the reality is it wasn’t framed with sports corruption in mind,’’ he said.

It is this loophole that cricketers and bookies have taken advantage of and are able to move about freely even if they are found to be guilty by investigative bodies and banned. They have gone to court, got the bans lifted and continue to hold either high offices in politics or cricket associations or appear in movies and TV shows.

According to Richardson the players are not the main problem when it comes to match-fixing. They are the final link in the chain which actually goes out onto the pitch and performs any act if they had agreed to do so.

“The problem I see is further upstream and it is the people who are organising the corruption, people who are paying the players the money who should be mainly targeted,’’ Richardson said.

To support his stance, Richardson provided the example of the Bribery Act in the UK, which was used to prosecute former Pakistan batsman Nasir Jamshed, who pleaded guilty to charges of bribery in the PSL.

Jamshed was handed a 17-month sentence in February by a Manchester court. In 2010, the Pakistan trio of Salman Butt, Mohammad Asif and Mohammad Amir were prosecuted under the 1906 Prevention of Corruption Act which was repealed by the Bribery Act.

Singh was of the view that there is no adequate law to cover match-fixing which both the Indian government and the courts have recognised previously in dealing with such cases. There is a requirement for a law which criminalises match fixing, the roots of which lie in betting which Singh described as “a malaise’’ in India.