Chennai Super Kings owner Gurunath Meiyappan was arrested here late tonight for his alleged involvment in betting on IPL matches, threatening the future of the franchise and continuance of his father-in-law N Srinivasan as BCCI chief.
“We have interrogated Gurunath based on information we have. We have gone through the questioning of him in detail and after due deliberations, we have come to the conclusion that there is evidence of his involvement in the offence (of IPL betting) we are investigating. We have placed him under arrest”, Joint Commissioner (Crime) of Mumbai Police Himanshu Roy told reporters.
He said Gurunath will be produced before a court within 24 hours as per the law.
35-year-old Gurunath was summoned by Mumbai Police for questioning after actor Vindoo Dara Singh implicated him in betting.
Gurunath flew here by a chartered aircraft from Madurai a little after missing the 5 pm deadline set by police for questioning.
Gurunath reached Mumbai late in the evening accompanied by noted Chennai lawyer P S Raman.
He was taken from the Mumbai airport to the Crime Branch headquarters and subjected to interrogation before being arrested.
Gurunath was arrested after nearly three hours of questioning that began at 9.30 pm, Roy said adding he will be produced before a metropolitan court tomorrow.
The honcho of CSK, twice IPL champions, Gurunath, was in the eye of a huge storm after actor and TV reality show winner Vindoo admitted to having placed bets on his behalf.
Vindoo, winner of reality show Bigg Boss season 3 and son of late wrestler-actor Dara Singh, was allegedly in “frequent touch” with Gurunath during the IPL matches and was claimed to have told Mumbai crime branch that the CSK owner had lost Rs 1 crore through betting.
Though Roy did not say during his post-arrest media briefing about whether Meiyappan was also involved in spot-fixing of IPL matches, he had earlier said strong suspicions did exist.
“We suspect Meiyappan gave inside information to arrested actor Vindoo Randhawa who passed on those to the bookies,” Roy had told reporters ahead of Meiyappan’s questioning.
With Meiyappan’s arrest, the pressure on Srinivasan for his resignation is set to mount further as several of his rivals in the cricket establishment have already started gunning for him.
Former IPL chief Lalit Modi demanded that after the arrest of Gurunath, CSK be scrapped from IPL.
With the future of the hugely popular cricket competition facing uncertainty, Modi suggested the best way forward with IPL is that team owners should move the court and get an order to run the competition.
“It is the team owners who stand to lose most if the IPL dies and if they do not come forward and take charge of the tournament, it is bound to die”, he said.
——PTI