THE TORONTO STAR, April 27, 2008

SONYA FATAH

DELHI, India–India has a new addition to its menu of spicy offerings: masala cricket, a.k.a. the multi-million dollar Indian Premier League, which launched this month with a spectacular opening ceremony in Bangalore.

With a heady mix of Bollywood stars, deep-pocketed owners and squads of NFL-style cheerleaders strutting their stuff, the league has sparked a frenzy in India.

The big-bucks draw of the IPL could change the face of the international sport forever, drawing some of the world’s best bowlers and batsmen. League boss Lalit Modi said it’s a sign of India’s confidence and its growing international leadership as the league kicked off.

“India has been subservient for 100 years,” he told reporters. “If it’s our turn to have some glory, so much the better.”

The world’s largest cricket following resides in this nation of 1 billion people, most of whom are also hooked on Bollywood.

The game, which is passionately watched in the countries where it is played, draws little excitement elsewhere.

Now, hoping to compete with newer, snazzier forms of sports entertainment, Indian cricket is taking a page out of the American sports book hoping to extend its army of supporters in India and overseas. For Indo-Canadians, too, the league may be giving cricket a new surge of life.

The IPL offers the shortened form of traditional cricket known as Twenty20, with matches lasting about three hours. Nothing of this sort has been seen before in the international cricketing world, where traditionally matches are traditionally played over a five-day period.

Up for grabs is $3 million in total prize money, about $1.2 million of it for the winning team in a hectic but charged tournament of 59 three-hour games played over a month and a half in eight major urban centres.

The season was launched in Bangalore, India’s high-technology hub, with a huge bang.

Branding itself as “cricket’s richest tournament,” organizers put on an enthralling show for the crowd of 55,000 at M. Chinnaswamy stadium.

Acrobats walked tightropes across the field, with colour laser beams and fireworks lighting up the sky. Bollywood tunes blared as NFL cheerleaders from with Washington Redskins, specially flown in for the event, danced up a storm.

Not so long ago, India cricket officials shunned the shortened format, which was launched in the United Kingdom five years ago. But when the Indian cricket team brought home the championship trophy after defeating long-time rivals Pakistan in the first-ever Twenty20 world cup, officials who had previously tried to discourage the starting of a similar league, dove headlong into negotiations for a new league.

The result? Eight new teams with such evocative names as Delhi Daredevils, Bangalore Royal Challengers and Deccan Chargers, some bought by India’s commercial dons, including Vijay Mallya of Kingfisher Airlines and United Breweries Ltd., and Mukesh Ambani of Reliance Industries Ltd.

Team franchises were sold for a total of just under $725 million, and in February, a unique players’ auction netted India’s national team captain, M.S. Dhoni, for nearly $1.5 million and Australia’s Andrew Symonds for $1.35 million.

In a television interview on a major network, Symonds was asked what he would do with the money.

“I like to fish, so I guess I’ll go and get some fishing rods,” he offered.

Analysts weren’t quite sure how well the tournament would do.

The hype was palpable as huge amounts of money were poured into star-studded television advertising and new teammates were paraded about in flashy uniforms.

So far, the result has been magical, with stands full to capacity and soaring television ratings.

The country’s most popular film hero, Shahrukh Khan, who owns Kolkata franchise, has not only attended every match his team has played, he’s also brought along a long list of film and political celebrities to cheer on his Knight Riders.

With the India’s political dynasty’s future leaders – Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi – and other political stalwarts up on their feet in the stands, the IPL has attracted a wide range of viewers.

But critics still wonder whether the league’s overt commercialization will take away from the game itself, making players only part of a spectacle that seeks to line cricket’s coffers while wooing young viewers with limited attention spans.

“It’s wonderful that players are getting paid as much as they are,” said legendary former batsmen, Javed Miandad, who played for the Pakistan team.

“But the motivation here is commercial. Time will tell, but Twenty20 is not a format through which I think the game can grow or talent can be picked.”

The Globe and Mail, Thursday, March 22, 2007

SONYA FATAH
with a report from Associated Press

ISLAMABAD — Did Pakistan’s cricket coach have the skinny on the betting underworld? Was he going to do a tell-all in his coming book? Did a rabid fan angry about Pakistan’s dismissal from the World Cup want him dead? Or did Bob Woolmer die of shock because his boys were outclassed by a team considered to be far inferior?

As the Jamaican police opened a special investigation into the recent and sudden death of Woolmer, the rumour mill was abuzz and conspiracy theories were all the rage across Pakistan.

The news stunned the cricketing world and cast a pall of gloom over the World Cup. Cricket fans, commentators and analysts thought that Woolmer, who was 58 and suffered from health problems, had died of effects of stress and shock after his team’s loss to cricketing minnow Ireland last Saturday.

But when the Jamaican police started a full-scale investigation on Tuesday and whispers of murder spread through the dressing rooms, Pakistan’s passionate cricket following struggled to handle the news.

“This country is so crazy,” said Kamil Rahim, 25, a native of Karachi, “that anything is possible.”

“On one hand, I don’t think he was murdered because this is about Pakistan. And I think the world is just creating a spectacle because Pakistan is Pakistan and it’s entirely believable that in Pakistan a coach can be killed,” Rahim said.

But, like many Pakistanis, Rahim is also questioning the role of the organized crime element that runs the cricket betting underworld. “If he was murdered, it was basically in order to silence him, and fingers should probably be pointing at bookies,” Rahim said.

Woolmer was expected to complete his contract with the Pakistani team in April and settle down to write a book. It’s not clear what the content of his book might have been but it has been reported in the Pakistani press that Woolmer might have known quite a bit about the betting underworld.

A report on GEO TV, a private television channel, went a few steps further. It reminded viewers that Woolmer had coached the South African team when Hansie Cronje, who was barred from cricket after his shock admission to having fixed a match, was the captain. “[Cronje] was killed suddenly in a plane crash,” a voiceover stated, linking the two deaths. “Was that a suicide or a murder? We still don’t know. Now Mr. Woolmer is dead. Was his death a murder or a suicide?”

Many believe Cronje was soon to pen his knowledge of the betting underworld. The show suggested Woolmer was about to do the same.

“If it’s murder, it has to be because he had sensitive information that someone did not want to get out,” said Aleha Khan, 31, an enthusiastic cricket fan.

But many still believe there is much hype and speculation behind the police investigation.

“I think he was just devastated,” said one fan, who did not want to be identified. “I don’t think he was murdered. I think Bob Woolmer was a professional and the team’s disastrous performance shocked him. I think they are making too much of this.”

Woolmer was found unconscious in his hotel room in Kingston the morning after Pakistan’s humiliating loss to Ireland. He was taken to hospital, were he was declared dead. The results of an autopsy were inconclusive. But police opened a full-scale investigation and are awaiting results of a pathology test.

There were unconfirmed reports that there were marks on Woolmer’s neck, suggesting that someone had tried to strangle him.

Woolmer’s wife, Gill, appeared in an Indian television interview late yesterday and said she knew the death was being viewed as suspicious, but discounted conspiracy theories.

She also confirmed her husband had Type 2 diabetes, but was not on prescribed medication for it. She said he had been prescribed anti-inflammatory drugs.

Woolmer had sent her an e-mail message after the upset loss to Ireland, which had upset him, Gill told NDTV. “He e-mailed me the following morning,” she said. “He did mention that he was really depressed and could not believe how this could have happened.

“The Pakistani team’s poor performance affected him as any other big tournament that he lost as a coach,” she told NDTV. “He believed that what happened, happened. . . . one has to move on.”

Football and hockey are hardly the only big-league sports with betting scandals — millions are riding on the results of tomorrow’s series finale between India and Pakistan. SONYA FATAH visits a big-time Karachi bookie who’s in the thick of it

The Globe and Mail, Saturday, February 18, 2006

SONYA FATAH

A surveillance camera in the den scans the street, but little about the two-storey home in an elite Karachi neighbourhood identifies it as a major betting operation. Inside, the place is barely furnished, but in a room upstairs eight phones sit lined up on a Formica tabletop, each attached to a tape recorder.

Meanwhile, the head honcho, who asks to be called “Javed,” sits behind a desk fielding calls from clients who are betting hundreds of thousands of rupees on one of sport’s titanic struggles: the India-Pakistan cricket series that wraps up tomorrow in Karachi.

Nearby, an assistant furiously jots down bets on a printed pad, while in the corner another man handles overseas calls from such places as Britain, Canada and Saudi Arabia. On the far side of the room, an analyst follows every move of the match being played and speculates on the fast-changing rates as wickets fall and balls are smashed to the edges of the pitch. Meanwhile, at the top of the gambling food chain, the big bosses sit in far-off Dubai, using two hotline connections to determine Javed’s rates as the match unfolds.

Even though it’s illegal, cricket betting is no small business in Pakistan, where virtually everyone is obsessed with the game. Javed’s operation is one of roughly 20 in Karachi, and today he is handling bets he says total about 50 million Pakistani rupees, almost $1-million.

But the Pakistani market is small potatoes compared with its next-door neighbour. “If you equate the size of India’s betting business with a Hummer,” he says, “then the size of Pakistan’s business is about the size of a Honda 50-cc motorbike.”

India’s DNA newspaper reports that betting on Thursday’s fourth match in the series was expected to top $260-million. And it hardly matters that India’s decisive win sealed a series victory even before tomorrow’s final match. “Betting numbers are not affected by the match’s outcome,” Javed explains.

Also, there is little threat of interference from the authorities because officials at all levels are on bookies’ payrolls. “Everyone is involved,” Javed says nonchalantly. Every month, a middleman transfers a certain sum, called maheena, to police and intelligence officers.

But there is one thing that bookies, punters and spectators alike can’t abide: players who decide to cross the line. Just as the National Hockey League was relieved when hockey players caught up in the Rick Tocchet betting scandal weren’t accused of placing wagers on their own sport, big-league cricket takes a dim view of anything that suggests games are being fixed.

In 2000, former South African captain Hansie Cronje was banned from the game for life after he admitted to match-fixing. At the time, investigators discovered that he wasn’t the only national captain with strong links to big bookies. “The Cronje Affair” jump-started a series of investigations that eventually ended the career of Indian captain Mohammad Azharuddin, led to Pakistani stars Wasim Akram and Salim Malik being put on trial, and allegations being made against Australian national players as well.

Just as the NHL is grappling with its negative fallout, the exposés damaged the spirit of cricket and undermined the steadfast faith of its global following. So the International Cricketing Council (ICC) clamped down, making an example of players such as Mr. Cronje and imposing a whole new set of rules.

Speculation that matches are fixed persists among cricket’s much-obsessed audience. But since the Cronje affair, a team of observers hired by the ICC is always present to oversee any international series. Also, players can no longer carry cellphones or talk to non-participants during matches.

So now “things are not so blatant,” says Fereshteh Gati-Aslam, a former sportswriter with the daily English paper The News, who was called to testify before a Pakistani judicial committee on betting, bribery and match-fixing. “Which means that games are not being fixed by teams, but what the individuals do in their own capacity is not commented on any more, mostly because it’s very hard to prove. There can be speculation, but no direct accusation.”

So, while outright fixing is now rare, cricket analysts claim that many players are willing to help influence so-called “fancy” betting.

In fact, Javed says fancy (also known as index or session) betting is now the norm. Bettors put down money on scores per session, which means betting at the close of 15, then 30 and finally 50 overs, with the odds fluctuating as the match goes on. Every run, boundary, six scored changes the rate of return offered by bookies. As well, bets are placed on toss decisions, whether a score will be even or odd, or whether someone will score a century.

“Australia,” Javed says, “is a big champion of session betting. They’ll play defensively for the first 15 overs and keep the run rate down. Then they’ll slog it out in the 16th over, once the session is over,” and the final betting rates are set.

In 2003, former Pakistan captain Rashid Latif, a strong advocate of clean cricket, appealed to the ICC. “I am not accusing any team or players of indulging in this,” he wrote. “I am merely identifying a loophole . . . which has created big opportunities of making money and indirectly influencing the outcome of matches. This provides a chance for the bookies to approach top-order batsmen to achieve unusual scores and affect the complexion of competitive matches.”

Yet Javed swears that the current Pakistan team is not involved in fancy fixing. “You want to know why?” he asks. “You know they’ve all become very religious of late . . . There’s no way they would involve themselves in fixing matches.”

Others take a darker view. “Even if fancy fixing does exist,” a senior cricket writer says, “people would rather sweep it under the carpet. The public would like to think it’s not happening.”

But an increased religiosity is certainly evident. When former Pakistani batsman Saeed Anwer lost his three-year-old daughter, he turned to religion and brought many fellow cricketers to Islamic enlightenment as well. Islamic preachers have influenced the team deeply, and helped to project a cleaner image. “It also creates a public impression that ‘we’re not involved,’ ” the skeptical writer adds.

Back at his betting shops, Javed says he hasn’t been “involved” all that long himself. He has been a big-league bookie for five years. Three years before that, he was on the other side of the fence. “I was a client,” he says. “When I lost all my money betting, I figured I better get it back from where I lost it.”

So he started taking bets from friends and soon built a reputation. Now, he and four partners run two locations with about 12 employees while the big bosses sits safely in Dubai, where they determine the odds, which are communicate via telephone hotlines to bookies in both India and Pakistan.

Once broke, Javed says he has everything money can buy. “You can’t imagine the amount of money that’s in this business. It’s beyond calculation.” For his own security, every conversation is taped and the neighbourhood is under constant surveillance. And “if something goes wrong, in the rare instance that a client refuses to cough up money, there are ways to take care of him,” Javed says. “Physical and mental torture, for instance.”

But that’s a rarity, he insists, because, ultimately, gambling is not a bad business. “Look, we’re not killers,” he emphasizes. “The police are after terrorists, drugs, weapons. This is just a money game.”