Lodha panel exposes gross inadequacies of BCCI's anti-corruption code

Cricket, it would seem, has a pretty sophisticated mechanism to deal with corruption. It has a code that was specifically drafted to address match-fixing and even a specialised unit to investigate and prosecute related offences. Football, for instance, treats match-fixing simply as part of its regular disciplinary architecture. While cricket’s code defines offences such as “betting” and “improper use of inside information” and prescribes penalties for those found guilty of these offences, football’s disciplinary code does not specifically cover these acts. [caption id=“attachment_2346036” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] The Lodha panel had to go outside the BCCI’s anti-corruption code. Firstpost[/caption] As it turns out, this sophistication is not enough to punish the misdeeds of team owners and franchisees. When the Supreme Court-appointed Justice Lodha committee wanted to mete out exemplary punishment to the owners and franchisees found guilty of match-fixing related offences in the IPL 2013 scandal, it had to look outside cricket’s anti-corruption codes. The foundations of cricket’s anti-corruption architecture had already been exposed as hollow when in January this year, the Supreme Court of India struck down the regulations that permitted N. Srinivasan to be the President of the BCCI and have an interest in an IPL franchise at the same time. Now, with the recommendations of the Justice Lodha committee, it is clear that the rot extended beyond the foundations to the sophisticated edifice. The power to punish for match-fixing offences Cricket had responded to its gravest crisis - the investigations into match-fixing in 2000 that led to the permanent disgrace of two highly regarded national captains - by setting up a dedicated Anti-Corruption and Security Unit (ACSU) under the ICC Anti-Corruption Code. Not too long after, the BCCI, the body that governs cricket in India, adopted a similar code. Sports governing bodies are largely not equipped to detect and investigate instances of match-fixing, and as we saw with the IPL 2013 scandal, it is usually the police or the media that are able to bring them to light. The only thing they can do well in the fight against match fixing is prosecute and punish effectively. They have the power to truncate the careers or expunge the records of athletes who have been found guilty of disciplinary infractions. Arguably, these punishments provide a greater deterrent compared to those that the criminal legal systems may legitimately impose on those found guilty of sporting crimes. One would have assumed that the BCCI’s anti-corruption code would provide the ammunition necessary to punish Gurunath Meiyappan, Raj Kundra, and the IPL team owners that they were part of, that is, India Cements Limited which owned a part of the Chennai Super Kings and Jaipur IPL Cricket Pvt. Ltd. which owned a part of the Rajasthan Royals. As it turned out, the panel could not rely on the code alone to recommend the kind of penalties that would restore public faith in the game. Beyond BCCI’s anti-corruption code To suspend Meiyappan and Kundra from most cricket-related activities for life, the panel had to use their guilt under the extremely broad terms – “contrary to the spirit of the game” and “brings the game into disrepute” - contained in Article 2.4.4 of the IPL Code of Conduct for Players and Team Officials. This was probably because the maximum punishment for the offence of “betting” under the anti-corruption code was only a five-year suspension from cricket-related activities. The panel clearly felt that the circumstances of the IPL 2013 scandal required them to mete out punishment of stronger deterrent value but the anti-corruption code did not give them the weapons to do so. Thus, even though the panel could rely on the Supreme Court’s assertion that there was enough evidence to suggest that Meiyappan and Kundra were guilty of the offence of “betting” under the anti-corruption code, it felt compelled to look elsewhere in order to justify harsher penalties. They found support in the broadly defined offences in the IPL Code of Conduct, which corresponded to the harsh penalties specified in Article 7 of the Code of Conduct and Article 6.4 of the IPL Operational Rules. Similarly, when the panel recommended that both India Cements and Jaipur IPL Cricket be suspended from the IPL for two years for failing to ensure that Meiyappan and Mundra complied with the anti-corruption code, it had to look beyond the anti-corruption code, which does not apply to franchisees. They found firm ground instead, in the sanctions listed in Section 6.4 of the IPL Operational Rules. Even though the panel did not quite point this out, it should embarrass the BCCI and the ICC that the three judges had to look beyond their codes to mete out strict penalties to Meiyappan, Kundra, India Cements, and Jaipur IPL Cricket. It required an extraordinary level of shamelessness from the country’s cricket governing body for the highest court in the country to have had to appoint retired judges to decide penalties for match-fixing related offences. Given the BCCI’s audacious track record of willful blindness, perhaps the panel should have specifically pointed out these shortcomings in cricket’s anti-corruption architecture. Cricket’s governing bodies should take note. The anti-corruption codes should be amended so that exemplary punishment can be meted out even to owners and franchisees. (Aju John is part of the faculty at myLaw.net, where he teaches courses on Sports Law and Media Law.)