Huge no-ball landed TP Sudhindra in trouble

MUMBAI: TP Sudhindra, who was banned for life by the BCCI on Friday, was caught in a sting operation by a TV channel purportedly agreeing to bowl a no-ball for Rs 50,000 in a local match in Indore when he was approached by the channel's reporters in April last year. The channel had also showed Sudhindra bowling a huge no-ball on the second ball of his first over which made a case against him.
Sudhindra arrived at the BCCI office on Saturday afternoon to present his point of view. Board president N Srinivasan, vice-president Arun Jaitley and IPL governing council member Niranjan Shah were present at the hearing.
Uttar Pradesh cricketer Shalabh Srivastava, who plays for Kings XI Punjab, was handed a five-year ban for agreeing to spot-fix a match and bowl a no-ball for Rs 10 lakh. Unlike Sudhindra, who actually committed the act of bowling a no-ball and ended up receiving a life ban, Srivastava gets a five-year term because he agreed to bowl the no-ball but did not actually indulge in any such act.
Srivastava did not personally attend the hearing but presented his point of view to the committee via teleconference. "(Shalabh) Srivastava was held guilty of agreeing to fix a match and negotiate terms for the same, even though no actual match-fixing or spot-fixing took place," the board said.
Three other cricketers — Amit Yadav, Mohnish Mishra and Abhinav Bali — were handed a one-year ban each for indulging in "loose talk, unsubstantiated bragging and bringing the game into disrepute".
Mishra, who has played for Madhya Pradesh, Deccan Chargers and Pune Warriors, was quoted by the channel as saying, "Franchisees pay black money to us players. Pune gave me Rs 1.5 crore, out of which Rs 1.2 crore was black money." Yadav, who plays for Goa and Kings XI Punjab, was found guilty of agreeing to shift from his IPL team if he received Rs 20 lakh from another team instead of the Rs 10 lakh being paid by Punjab.
The N Srinivasan-led committee perused the report submitted by the board's Anti-Corruption Unit chief Ravi Sawani.