PRATAP CHAKRAVARTY, New Delhi | Monday 1.18pm
INDIAN police on Monday said they have gathered fresh evidence to shore up their case against South African cricket skipper Hansie Cronje on match-fixing charges.
“We believe we now have sufficient evidence in this case but it is for the courts to decide,” New Delhi Crime Branch chief Pradeep Srivastava said, describing additional evidence obtained by the police as “clinching.”
Srivastava said detectives from his crime branch now have proof that Cronje was in close contact with a London-based bookie, Sanjay Chawla, during South Africa’s March 9-19 one-day series in India.
“The continued association between Chawla and Cronje began long before their contacts in New Delhi,” he said, alleging that Chawla stayed in the same hotel with Cronje during the first one-day match in the southern city of Cochin.
The crime branch chief said the police are in possession of evidence besides tapes of purported conversations between Cronje, Chawla and his associate Rajesh Kalra, who is currently in police custody.
“We have more than just the tapes which are now sealed but what we have are not for discussion. Whatever evidence we have will be produced in court in due course,” Srivastava said.
Indian police stunned the cricket world on Friday when they announced they were filing charges against Cronje and teammates Herschelle Gibbs, Nicky Boje and Pieter Strydom for allegedly fixing the one-day series which India won 3-2.
The South African government on Sunday stepped into the murky match-fixing row, calling in the Indian high commissioner and demanding access to the 14 voice tapes. Srivastava, however, insists there has been no formal demand from Pretoria for the recordings.
“We are also under no pressure from the South African authorities in our investigations,” he said, despite the growing diplomatic spat over the case. Pretoria also wants to know why the South African authorities were kept in the dark about the matter for weeks and were not informed ahead of the press conference.
Indian police, meanwhile, stepped up security for another suspect, Kishan Kumar, at a hospital where he is in the intensive care unit with cardiac problems.
Police said the extra security for the suspected bookie has been ordered amid fears that he could be the target of an assassination bid by gangsters in Noida, where he is hospitalised.
Allegations of match-fixing are not uncommon, particularly on the subcontinent where illegal betting on the outcome of matches is rife, with bets running into R22-billion a year.
Cricket matches are betted on globally — at the last World Cup English bookies accepted R3,9-billion in bets.