Ajay Shirke, the ousted BCCI secretary, has urged the Supreme Court-appointed Committee of Administrators to initiate a CBI investigation after the first match between India and Australia in Pune ended inside three days.

On a pitch that assisted spinners right from the start, the Australia spinners wreaked havoc as the visitors bowled out India for 105 and 107 in the two innings to register a comprehensive 333-run victory. The pitch has been given a poor rating by the ICC match referee Chris Broad and Shirke feels an investigation is important to get to the root cause of the issue.

This is not the first time that a pitch in India has been criticised for being substandard in recent times. A couple of years ago, the Nagpur pitch was given poor rating by match referee Jeff Crowe during the third Test between India and South Africa. That match also ended inside three days, with India winning by 124 runs as spinners accounted for 33 wickets.

“I would like to see a CBI inquiry being initiated by the administrators appointed by the Supreme Court. It (doctoring pitches) has often plagued Indian cricket and it is high time we to get to the root of this mess. Instead of pointing fingers at various people without any evidence, I would like to see a CBI probe to find out the real culprit. Let they (CBI) check the phone records and find out who is passing on these messages,” Shirke told Hindustan Times.

“(Ever) since the spot fixing (in IPL 2013) came to light, the whole Board has been thrown out. Now let us see what steps the court-appointed administrators take to get to the root of pitch fixing,” added Shirke.

The former BCCI secretary also slammed the MCA pitch curator Pandurang Salgaoncar for preparing a rank turner.

“Pune has historically prepared seaming wickets, so what has suddenly gone wrong? Was Pandurang Salgaoncar (local curator) intoxicated? Did he go mad?” concluded Shirke.