The policemen were successful in finding the guilty after their probe in the recently concluded Karnataka Premier League. The team owner of Belgavi Panthers Ali Asfak Thara was arrested for his involvement in Cricket Betting during the course of the tournament.
The buyer of a Karnataka Premier League cricket team was arrested by the police in relation with a betting scandal on Tuesday, police said. The accused was identified as Ali Asfak Thara, the owner of KPL team Belagavi Panthers.
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The players are being questioned
The police claimed to have busted an international cricket betting scandal with his arrest. Ali, they said, had placed bets on matches with a Dubai based bookie. According to the report, the police are looking into his involvement in any instance of match-fixing.
The report also says that the CCB began the probe after the BCCI’s anti-corruption unit alerted the police. This comes just over a week after it came to light that BCCI filed an FIR against two individuals for an alleged attempt of match-fixing in women’s cricket.
”Ali Asfak Thara is the prime accused in the betting racket. We have not established whether there was any match-fixing too. The players are being questioned,” Sandeep Patil, Joint Commissioner of Police (Crime), said.
“We are investigating Thara’s role in an alleged match-fixing. Especially, in which a few players of other teams are reportedly involved. We have summoned them also for questioning. He was in touch with some of them,” Patil said in a statement.
Ali has also been involved in promoting T20 cricket in Sri Lanka. He organised an inter-academy tournament a few years ago. During KPL, there were allegations of matches being fixed with bookies operating online offering full details of ‘fixed’ events in a match and the final result at the start of games to people signing up on Whatsapp.