In a bizarre case that astonished the entire nation recently, a fake IPL T20 scam was busted by Mehsana Police in Gujarat, which was organized to cheat punters in Russia who placed bets on players through Telegram and WhatsApp.
In an exclusive conversation with Indian Masterminds, Superintendent of Police, Mehsana, IPS officer Achal Tyagi shared details about the fake match and how people associated with them were arrested by the police.
IPL T20 SCAM
The incident took place in a remote farm at Molipur village on the outskirts of the Mehsana district. Here, the main mastermind of the plan, a man named Shoeb Davda who worked in a Russian pub for eight months before returning to Molipur village, along with his partner Asif Mohammad staged a fake IPL tournament that was broadcasted on YouTube to scam punters sitting in Russia to extract money from the bets they placed.
For this purpose, the duo prepared a cricket ground on a rented agricultural field, and to make it look authentic, the field was lit by halogen lights, the umpires flaunted their walkie-talkies, and crowd-noise sound effects were added in the background from actual IPL matches.
They further hired 24 youngsters from the village and employed them to play cricket. Every player was given Rs. 500 to play for the entire day. Not suspecting any foul play, the young players readily agreed to play for money. They were provided with proper cricket kits and jerseys of IPL teams like Mumbai Indians, Chennai Super Kings, and Gujarat Titans. They even had a person mimic Harsha Bhogle, a well-known cricket commentator, to make the YouTube broadcast look more authentic.
“Even though the entire thing was pretty mismanaged and imperfect, the setup was good enough to trick unsuspecting people into believing it was a genuine cricket league. The second team that went out to bat in each match was given clear instructions on how to play and how many runs to score in an over or the overall match. This is how they were manipulating the game,” Mr. Tyagi told Indian Masterminds.
A TIP-OFF
The first suspicion of foul play arose in the players within 2-3 days of the tournament, when they observed that they were being given instructions on the number of runs that they had to score. Gradually, the word started spreading and it wasn’t long before the police informants got a whiff of it. They realized that something fishy was going on as cameras were recording these matches and the players were being given instructions.
“They went to the area, talked to the players and the umpire, and extracted all the information required for us to raid the place. We interrogated everyone and understood what was going on and decided to take action accordingly,” shared Mr. Tyagi.
ACTION TAKEN BY POLICE
The Mehsana police arrested four people on the spot and one person from Meerut, Uttar Pradesh. However, the officer believes that the big fish is still out in the ocean as the main leader and mastermind of this entire scam is sitting in Russia, from where he is operating.
“All the matches were being televised on YouTube and were being used primarily in Russia for betting purposes. We are yet to get to those people operating from Russia,” says Mr. Tyagi.
He has registered cases against all the accused under The Public Gambling Act, 1867, the IT Act, 2000, and also for cheating. They were further kept in police custody for a few days.
“Shoeb Davda arranged for all the funding for the tournament. He was given Rs. 8 lakhs for managing the field, player’s kits, remuneration, and refreshments. The video recorder and streamer, named Saqib, who was from Meerut originally, was arrested along with him. The other two people, who were locals operating as umpires, were also a part of the entire thing, so they were also taken under custody,” he told Indian Masterminds.
The Mehsana IPL scam garnered a lot of public attention mainly because usual betting cases are registered for people gambling on cricket matches, but in this particular case, an entire tournament was staged and manipulated to facilitate gambling from overseas.
It also shows that the Russian punters placing bets were not serious cricket or sports lovers but were gambling just for kicks, since they could not figure out that the match and players weren’t real and it was all a set-up.
