'Would like to know who was involved' - BCCI after a T20 tournament in Chandigarh gets streamed online as Sri Lankan league

A T20 match played near Chandigarh amid the COVID-19 pandemic. However, in an unusual occurrence, the game was streamed online as a Sri Lankan T20 League game. The T20 match, which was played in Sawara village, 16 km from Chandigarh, was streamed as a ‘UVA T20 League’ encounter.

The incident caught the attention of BCCI’s Anti-Corruption Unit as well as Punjab Police. The state police said that they’re investigating into the matter to see if there’s any involvement of a betting syndicate.

The Indian board, on the other hand, stated that they would’ve taken an action against them if it was a BCCI-approved league. If the T20 match was organized only for the sake of betting purposes, it will be classified as a criminal offence, handing the jurisdiction to the police.

“Our process is on. When we will know about the people involved, we will update our database. We would like to know who was involved. However, only police can take action on this. As a BCCI enforcement agency, we have no jurisdiction over it,” BCCI anti-corruption chief Ajit Singh said, as quoted by India Today.

“If it was a BCCI approved league or had players’ participation, we could have taken against them. If this is done for the purpose of betting, it is a criminal offence and police has the jurisdiction over, we don’t,” he added.

Betting could be going on in the match: Mohali SSP Kuldeep Singh Chahal

Bhagiradhan Balachandran, assistant secretary of the Uva Province Cricket Association, also pointed out that someone has used their name for being a relatively less-active cricket association of the island nation.

“The whole thing seems like a farce. We are not the most active cricket association in Sri Lanka, so somebody did proper research on that and used our name. We have no idea about this and no Sri Lankan players were involved,” said Bhagiradhan.

Mohali’s Senior Superintendent of Police, Kuldeep Singh Chahal, pointed out the possibility of betting being involved in the occurrence.

“A case under Section 420 IPC (cheating) has been registered by the police. As per preliminary investigations, betting could be going on in the match which was held. Further investigations into the case are under progress,” stated Chahal.