New Delhi: The Supreme Court Friday said BCCI Ombudsman Justice (retd) D K Jain will reconsider within three months the quantum of punishment for former Indian cricketer S Sreesanth for his alleged involvement in the 2013 IPL spot fixing scandal.
A bench of Justices Ashok Bhushan and KM Joseph said this while hearing an application filed by the BCCI. The sport’s apex body said that since its disciplinary committee, which had earlier dealt with Sreesanth’s matter, is no longer operational the matter be referred to the ombudsman appointed by the apex court.
The top court march 15 had set aside the BCCI disciplinary committee’s order imposing a life ban on Sreesanth for his alleged involvement in the matter.
The top court had also said that its verdict will have no effect on the criminal proceedings pending against Sreesanth in the Delhi High Court, where the Delhi Police has challenged a trial court’s order discharging all accused, including him in the IPL spot-fixing case.
A single-judge bench of the Kerala High Court had lifted the life ban imposed on the 35-year-old cricketer by the BCCI and set aside all proceedings against him initiated by the board. However, the division bench of the high court later restored the ban on a petition filed by the BCCI against the single-judge bench’s order.
The BCCI had February 28 told the apex court that the life ban imposed on Sreesanth was ‘fully sustainable in law’ as he had ‘tried to influence’ a match.
However, Sreesanth’s lawyer had countered the arguments and had told the court that no spot-fixing took place during the IPL match and allegations levelled against the cricketer were not substantiated by evidence.
Sreesanth had earlier claimed in the top court that the life ban was ‘completely unfair’ and the Delhi Police had ‘continuously tortured’ him in custody to extract confession of his involvement in the case.