BCCI files case against Prabhakar
Suparn Verma in Bombay
The Board of Control of Cricket in India has filed a Rs 50 million defamation case in the Bombay high court against cricketer Manoj Prabhakar and four staffers of 
Outlook magazine -- editor Vinod Mehta, publisher Deepak Shourie and correspondents Krishna Prasad and Aniruddh Bahal.
The BCCI has sought that if it wins the case, the defendants should pay the full cost plus 18 per cent interest on the Rs 50 million till it is paid in full.
Prabhakar had alleged in the magazine that one of his colleagues in the Indian cricket team had offered him Rs 2.5 million to help lose a Singer Cup match in Sri Lanka.
"How long could we tolerate those defamatory articles against us? That's why the BCCI filed a defamation case against him" says Board secretary Jayant V Lele.
A representative of Mulla and Mulla, Crage, Blunt and Caroe, the legal firm representing the BCCI, said, "In a case like this, it is the person who has made the accusations who has to prove them in court."
The BCCI says it took action because Prabhakar refused to apologise publicly for making the charges. And what if he did apologise? Would the BCCI take back the case then?
"I can't say anything about that," said Lele.
Manoj Prabhakar himself indicates his unwillingness to back down.
"I don't understand why are they doing all this... But if this is what they want I will fight them to the very end. I was doing our country and the game of cricket a service by bringing this practice to their notice. But they are suing me for defamation.
"Why the hell should I apologise? I haven't done anything wrong," says the allrounder defiantly.
The Mulla and Mulla man, though, begs to differ.
"If I call you a cheat and when I take you to court, you apologise. Then you do it again and again apologise. That won't work. He has to substantiate his charges."
Sandhya, Prabhakar's wife, feels her husband is being victimised.
"Why can't they see that he loves cricket so much that it has given him the courage to stand alone and wage a fight to clean the system? He is a tiger, and look how they are treating him?" She felt the BCCI officials should understand that Prabhakar is naturally aggressive and treat him as their own child.
Prabhakar is seeking no sympathy though.
"I wonder what they want me to prove in court," he says, claiming he was proved right on all the three allegations he made.
"I said that in Sharjah the light was poor but we were made to play on. I was proved right. I said that captains Aamir Sohail and Mohammad Azharuddin went out to toss and that both came back claiming the other had won it. I was proved right. I said the Indian team batted slowly at Kanpur. I made them (the officials) see the tapes in slow motion. Again I was proved right. If I am wrong then, how come the Indian team's performance has improved so drastically this season?"
Prabhakar said he asked Lele why only four of the 94 pages of the Justice Y V Chandrachud report been printed. But Lele apparently told him that the remainder was only for the Board president -- Raj Singh Dungarpur -- to see.
"Chandrachud didn't even ask me to name the person who offered me a bribe. When my lawyer (Nidhesh Gupta) and I came out of our meeting with him we both looked up to each other and said, "He never asked the name of the player. Is this an inquiry?" Gupta will represent him in this case too.
Justice Chandrachud -- whom the Board assigned to investigate allegations of betting and matchfixing -- said he had not heard that the BCCI had filed a suit."It is not ethical for me to say anything on the case... 'The judge has no platform to vindicate his grievances'. I have never in my career as a judge discussed a case after I have given judgment... For me the case is over. I have given my report," he told Rediff On The NeT.
Prabhakar had said earlier that he would name the player only if got immunity and protection in return.
"Let them give that to me. When the report came out I used to receive threatening calls. Once my car was stopped and a pistol pushed into my face. This thing is so big that my life will be in danger if I say anything. So let them give me protection and immunity first... They don't want the truth to come out. That is why they are doing all this," he says.
"When Sunil Dev said in an interview that he had seen it happening in front of him, they did not sue him. Why didn't they do it? Because he is one of their men."
The Betting Controversy
|