JOIN USDelhi Police on Tuesday claimed to have seized several expensive articles purchased by arrested Rajasthan Royals cricketer Sreesanth using money received from bookies for spot-fixing in the Indian Premier League.
A Delhi court also remanded Sreesanth, Ajit Chandila and Ankeet Chavan and eight others in police custody for five more days,while four others were sent to judicial custody.
Metropolitan Magistrate Saumya Chauhan extended the police custody of the 11 till May 26 after Delhi Police said they needed to make more recoveries and the accused were required to be confronted with each other.
S N Srivastava, special commissioner of police (special cell), said Sreesanth was taken to a place in Jaipur where a mobile phone Blackberry Z10 model costing around Rs 42,000, gifted to his girlfriend, was recovered.
“Besides, Sreesanth spent Rs 1.95 lakh of the spot-fixing money on purchasing branded apparel for himself from Diesel's showroom in Mumbai,” Srivastava said. Police have also identified the store manager of Diesel's showroom in Mumbai who confirmed the matter.
“The entire payment was made in cash and the apparels have also been recovered,” Srivastava added.
When asked whether police would call Sreesanth's girlfriend to join the investigation, Srivastava emphatically said, “No.”
“She has nothing to do with the spot-fixing saga, hence, there is no question of calling her,” Srivastava said.
Voice sample taken
Meanwhile, for forensic evidence, police sent nine people, including Sreesanth, to Central Forensic Science Laboratory in outer Delhi’s Rohini, where their voice samples were taken. It would be matched with their tapped conversations. Police also took samples of their handwriting.
“The handwriting samples would be matched with the tainted players’ signature appeared on the contract papers of their franchisee team Rajasthan Royals,” Srivastava said.
Meanwhile, a former Railways and Indian Cricket League (ICL) cricketer, Baburao Yadav, who is from Maharashtra’s Chandrapur district, was arrested in the capital on Tuesday for questioning.
“Baburao figured in the tapped conversations, and will be arrested if his involvement in the case is confirmed,” Srivastava added. Baburao was an associate of three bookies arrested in Maharashtra’s Aurangabad district on Sunday. “He played his last match for Railways in 2007, and represented Ahmedabad Rockets and Hyderabad Heroes in the ICL,” sources added.
Srivastava confirmed that Baburao was in touch with Sunil Bhatia, Kiran Dole and Manish Gudewa in Nagpur, and arranged a meeting between Sunil and Ajit.
Delhi Police on Tuesday also received another complaint from Rajasthan Royals against the three players. The complainant was made by Satyendra Saraswat of Rajasthan Royals who in his complaint mentioned that Sreesanth, Ajit and Ankeet breached the terms and conditions of the franchisee, BCCI and ICC.
“The three players disobeyed the franchisee terms for their personal and financial gain hence, a criminal case be lodged under Sections 420 (Punishment for cheating), 120 B (Punishment for criminal conspiracy), 406 (Punishment for criminal breach of trust) and 409 (Criminal breach of trust by public servant, or by banker, merchant or agent) of IPC,” read the complaint.
Srivastava said they have added Section 409 into the FIR lodged on May 9 apart from 420 and 120 B. He further said there was no need to add section 406.
When asked whether the three arrested players knew about each others involvement in spot-fixing, Srivastava said the trio might have talked with each other regarding the crime, but police have not found any evidence in this regard.