G'day, all, hope you had a pleasant weekend.

I didn't, frankly. Because on Saturday evening, I got by courier a document titled "Observations on The Report of The Central Bureau of Investigation on Cricket Match Fixing and Related Malpractises" -- which constituted my reading matter on Sunday.

Those of you who are interested can go to the url: http://www.indiancricketboard.org/ and select the appropriate document, which is in fact the last in a list of five documents that have been reproduced on that website.

55 pages seems too little to keep a person occupied for most of Sunday (and leave him with a splitting headache, besides). But the pages are packed with so much of misinformation, so much of doublespeak, that you are constantly forced to refer to other documents to verify the various claims being made here.

To give you a for-instance of how cleverly the BCCI has juggled its figures, take the statement regarding the 1998 ICC Knockout Wills International Cup. The CBI had in its report stated that the BCCI earned Rs 46 lakh. The BCCI in its defence claims it earned Rs 51 lakh, and points out that there is a 10 per cent discrepancy between the CBI's report and the actual facts.

Curiosity drove me to refer to the Board's own balance sheet for the year 1998-1999. And what do you know -- in its income and expense statement for the Wills ICC Knockout Tournament, the board (and remember, what is being quoted here is the OFFICIAL BALANCE SHEET of the BCCI) says it received guarantee money from the ICC of US $110,000.

The only way that amount can translate into the 51 lakh the Board claims it earned, is if the rupee in 1998 traded 50 to the dollar. The fact, though, is that the highest the rupee has ever touched against the dollar is 46.92, sometime in the last fortnight. At no time in 1998 did the rupee ever cross 45 to the dollar, never mind 50. There is, thus, no way that the BCCI could have earned the 51 lakhs it claims it earned from the ICC as guarantee money -- the real figure is close to 46 lakhs, as claimed by the BCCI.

I could go on and on and on, citing discrepancies between what the board claims in this self-serving document, and what the board has said in its various balance sheets down the years.

Item: In its defensive document, the board says that the total expenditure for the year 1998-99 is Rs 306,196,983. In its audited balance sheet for the year, however, the total expenditure is shown as Rs 166,318,368.

Item: On Page 20 of its defense, the board says that during the year 1998-99, the total amount spent on coaching was Rs 87.55 lakh. In its official balance sheet, however, that amount is Rs 17,89,227.

So much for the facts. Now for the fiction -- and the BCCI's 'defense' is a masterpiece of fiction at its most convoluted. To give you an example of how words are twisted to create an impression different from actuality: It will be recalled that the CBI in its report had castigated the BCCI for playing in lesser venues, citing globalisation of the game, when "countries with a longer cricketing history like England and Australia are not doing so...."

Here is the BCCI's defense: "It is erroneous to assume that India alone has to 'shoulder this burden' and that 'countries with longer cricketing histories like England and Australia are not doing so.' The globalisation programme is the brainchild of the ICC and not of the BCCI. In fact, teams from England and MCC visit countries of Europe on a regular basis to promote the game. The teams from England and MCC have also visited Far East countries like Japan and Hong Kong. South Africa is a regular participant in the tournaments conducted by the African countries like Kenya, Namibia and Zambia. Australia has a regular programme of development in the East Asia Pacific region and its team visits countries like Fiji and Papua New Guinea."

Such a beautiful defence on the face of it. And so very diabolically clever when you think it through. Do you, for instance, recall hearing of the England team visiting any European country, or Japan and Hong Kong, to promote the game? (Hell, the England team did not even honour its commitment to play Bangladesh's first official Test). Do you recall the South African national side playing in Namibia and Zambia? Do you remember hearing of Australia's national team playing in Fiji?

Of course not -- because none of the above has happened. But no, the board is not lying -- merely fudging. The board says "teams from England... teams from South Africa... teams from Australia..."

The Sungrace team, if I remember right, toured in the USA a short while ago. Which means you can say that a "team from India" played in Los Angeles. But is that the same as the Indian team? Similarly, a club side from England tours Hong Kong -- and the Board tries to make you believe that England toured Hong Kong!

In another instance, the CBI castigated the board for paying so little attention to domestic cricket that we are left with no bench strength whatsoever. The board in its defence mentions a list of players who have played for India in the last three years, others who are "waiting in the wings", and then says, "Therefore the strength available in the reserve bench of India is rather attractive, contrary to being 'patehtic' as stated by the CBI. India was, in fact, the only country that could send two parallel teams of equal strength for the Commonwealth Games in Kuala Lumpur and the Sahara Cup in Toronto in September 1998."

Consider the awesome effrontery of that paragraph. In the first place, judged by your observation of Indian cricket in the last three years, would you say we have a bench strength? But never mind that -- India was the only country that COULD send two teams of equal strength? Really? Or is the real truth this -- that the BCCI's scheduling committee screwed up, found itself in a position of having to play two tournaments in two different parts of the world at the same time, tried to back out of the Sharjah commitment, was threatened with a lawsuit by the organisers, and ended up compromising, sending out two teams and finding it beaten in both venues?

This document deserves a detailed examination -- which is why we have handed it over, along with the various balance sheets officially released by the board -- to our chartered accountants to examine. Within the week, we hope to publish a post-mortem.

Meanwhile, even with this much, doesn't it make you wonder? If the CBI report is a "prostitute's diary", as the honourable Mr Kamal Morarka so pithily characterises it, what then is the BCCI's response -- a crook's manifesto?

While on Morarka, he seems to have taken over from Lele as the BCCI's resident joker. To me, his most intriguing statement is this: "What is this big thing the CBI has done? It has found that there is match-fixing. Big deal, for a long time, we have all known there is match-fixing."

This, from a vice president of the BCCI? The same organisation that claimed, via the Chandrachud report, that there was no match-fixing? The same organisation that characterised the Delhi police case against Cronje and company as "rubbish"? The same body that resisted the government's attempt to institute a CBI probe, arguing that there is no match-fixing?

You have known all along, Mr Morarka, that there is match-fixing? In that case, why not go further and tell us what you, and the body of which you are a vice-president, did to identify the fixers and check the menace, all these years?

Does it make you wonder why Morarka, who has been quiet all these years, is suddenly so vociferous? There is a very simple explanation: Some of the tainted players have indicated that if the punishments meted out to them are rigorous, they will talk. And that if they do, the likes of the Rungtas and the Dalmiyas will be sucked into the vortex.

Therefore, it has now become necessary to keep those players happy. To do that, only minimal punishment can be meted out. To justify that, the CBI has to be discredited, along with its report.

Ergo. Enter, left, Mr Morarka, "painted full of tongues", as Shakespeare once wrote.

Cheers, all

Prem

Mail Cricket Editor