MATCH REPORTS
STAT SHEET
DIARY
OTHER SPORTS
SLIDE SHOW
PEOPLE
DEAR REDIFF

Prabhakar didn't tell me who fixed the match, says Dalmiya

International Cricket Council president Jagmohan Dalmiya denied that Manoj Prabhakar had revealed the name of the player who allegedly offered him money to play below par.

Board of Control for Cricket in India president Raj Singh Dungarpur had said on Wednesday that he regretted that Prabhakar and Outlook magazine showed no remorse for the allegations they made that damaged the BCCI's reputation and that of the cricketers.

Prabhakar was quoted in a section of the media as saying that he had spoken to Dalmiya in confidence.

Refuting this allegation as "false and baseless", Dalmiya said that immediately after the article was published in Outlook, he had written to Prabhakar on June 6 last year. He said he had sought full details of the people involved and other relevant details so that the BCCI could inquire into the charges.

Dalmiya said Prabhakar responded on June 16, stating that he had already informed the concerned people and had been told to play his game and that they would do the needful. 'I feel no useful purpose would be served by my stating anymore facts, especially because it would be virtually impossible for me to prove the incident had occurred.'

Dalmiya, a former BCCI secretary himself, said this fact was widely reported in the media last June when the board appointed Justice Y V Chandrachud to go into the charges. "At no point of time did Manoj speak to me on this issue or take me into confidence and disclose the name''.

He said the tour management committee, the concerned authorities Prabhakar mentioned, had not mentioned any incident. Moreover the then captain (Mohammad Azharuddin) and vice-captain (Sachin Tendulkar), too had denied the allegations, Dalmiya said.

Meanwhile, Dungarpur, in a statement in Bombay, said it was not correct that the BCCI did not seek clarification and names, if any, of cricketers allegedly involved in match-fixing.

Dungarpur said when the BCCI officials called upon Prabhakar, he merely replied that statements attributed to him were correct and no useful purpose would be served by stating any more facts. He also allegedly told the officials that it would be virtually impossible to prove the statements. Despite the Chandrachud committee finding the allegations baseless, Prabhakar and Outlook's editor neither retracted them nor apologised.

He said the BCCI was compelled to go in for legal redress since the spirit of the game and image of cricketers and the Board were at stake. He stressed that the BCCI had not filed the Rs 50 million suit to earn money, but to vindicate its reputation and to ensure that people making or reproducing false and scurrilous statements would not go scot free.

The Betting Controversy