The CBI Report in Full -- Part 8

After coming back to India, Anil Steel asked MK to meet Azharuddin again and request him to make up for the losses during during the Titan Cup. Accordingly, MK took Ajay Sharma along with him and went to Hyderabad and met Azharuddin at his residence.

During the meeting, Azharuddin promised him that he would make up for the losses during the Titan Cup. Accordingly, MK went to Ahmedabad during the first test between India and South Africa where he was introduced to Dr Ali Irani by Azharuddin.

Dr Ali Irani also promised him that Azharuddin would compensate for his losses. Azhar told MK to make future payments to him through Dr Ali Irani. According to MK, Azharuddin told him that the Ahmedabad Test would not end in a draw, and India won that Test and MK recovered about 30 per cent of his previous losses.

In the second Test at Calcutta, Azharuddin informed him that India would lose the Test, and the result was on similar lines, and MK made up around 60 per cent of his losses. In the third Test at Kanpur, MK went to Kanpur and requested Azharuddin to introduce him to Hansie Cronje.

Accordingly, Azhruddin introduced him to Hansie Cronje as a diamond merchant, and MK asked Hansie Cronje his opinion about the fate of the Test. This was on the third day of the Test when the position of South Africa was already precarious.

Cronje told MK that South Africa would lose the Test, and MK paid a sum of $40,000 to Hansie Cronje for this information and as a future investment. Hansie also asked him to meet him in Bombay for the Mohinder Amarnath benefit match. However, when he met MK at 3 am on the day of the match, Cronje informed MK that he was not in a position to do anything about this match.

Somewhere around this time, Ajay Sharma had introduced Ajay Jadeja also to MK. Both of them had gone to his residence at Defence Colony along with a girl, and Ajay Jadeja offered to 'do' some matches for him. When MK asked about other players with whom he could tie up, Ajay Jadeja could promise only Nayan Mongia.

MK did not go ahead with this offer. However, Ajay Jadeja was paid a sum of Rs 50,000 during his visit to MK's residence. In 1996 during India's tour of South Africa, MK also visited South Africa. Before that tour, MK had paid around Rs 10 lakh to Azharuddin and also paid a sum of Rs 5 lakhs to Dr Ali Irani.

However, at this point in time, Azhar's predictions were not proving correct and MK thought he should cultivate the South African team. He came back to India between the second and third Tets and rang up Hansie Cronje, who assured him that South Africa would lose the third Test. However, that Test was drawn. Sometime during that period, MK had transferred around $50,000 to the bank account of Hansie Cronje in South Africa.

He went back to South Africa during the one-day series but stated that Hansie Cronje did not gather courage to meet him, since he had misled him about the third Test. However, he left a message on his mobile phone that he should forget the past and talk to him. Hansie Cronje rang up MK and apologized and promised him that South Africa would lose some of the one day matches and he would provide the exact information.

MK has stated that all the information provided by Hansie Cronje turned out incorrect and he suffered huge losses. When he spoke to Hansie Cronje about this, Cronje told him that India had played so badly and missed so many chances that he could not do anything about the result. After coming back to India, Azharuddin promised that he would 'do' some matches for him during the Sahara Cup Tournament at Toronto in 1997.

He informed MK that his wife Sangeeta Bijlani would ring him up and provide necessary information. MK stated that most of Sangeeta's predictions proved incorrect and MK got the feeling the couple was misleading him. MK thought that either Azharuddin was involved with other bookies at that time or he did not have the requisite number of players to fix a match.

During his association with Azhar, MK must have paid him around Rs 90 lakhs, which also included the money paid through Dr Ali Irani. However, a few months after the Sahara Cup in 1997, MK asked Azhar to return some of his money since his information had proved useless.

He stated that he recovered about Rs 30 lakhs in instalments which he collected from Azhar's locker at Hotel Taj Palace through one Anil Saxena, an employee of Hotel Taj Palace who was a close friend of Azhar, and also from Ajay Sharma who had come to deposit some money in the same locker. MK also revealed that Azharuddin had a permanent locker at Hotel Taj and used to operate it through Anil Saxena, who had the keys.

MK disclosed that Manoj Prabhakar was also on good terms with another punter, Tip Kohli, during his association with MK. MK further revealed the name of one Gyan Gupta and his family members and stated that they were also into match-fixing.

He added that the Pakistan team was very close to a bookie named Hanif Cadbury who was killed some time back in South Africa and most probably they were 'doing' matches for him also. MK revealed that all payments made by him in foreign exchange were transacted by him through hawala channels and foreign exchange was obtained from touts operating in Jama Masjid area in Delhi.

MK completely left betting and all other association with book-making in May 1998.

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