Picture Credit: Twitter
Gujarat Police has busted a huge racket for staging a fake IPL in Molipur village and accepting bets from Russian gamblers through an app. The fake IPL tournament was being run over the last 15 days and involved duplicate Chennai Super Kings (CSK), Mumbai Indians (MI), Gujarat Titans (GT) and other IPL Teams.
As per SOG PI, a man named Shoeb Davda was the leader of this racket. Davda had returned to Molipur after working in a Russian pub for eight months. The club was popular for taking bets and helped him execute this con. Reports further add that bets were placed on the league games from as far as Moscow, Tver, Voronezh and other European cities.
Shoeb Davda was live streaming these matches on a YouTube channel. Similarly, the organisers also managed to find a commentator who mimicked Harsha Bhogle during the live matches. Bhogle also reacted to news and tweeted, “Can't stop laughing. Must hear this "commentator".”
While speaking to the TOI, SOG PI said, "Shoeb hired the farm of Ghulam Masih and installed halogen lights there. He readied 21 farm labourers, promising them Rs 400 per match. Next, he hired cameramen and bought T-shirts of IPL teams. When the cops were tipped-off, they felt something was wrong."
The first installment of bets from Russia was around Rs 3 lakh which had been delivered when they were caught. “Shoeb would take live bets over the Telegram channel.” Rathod talked about how Shoeb would communicate with his deputy ‘Kolu’ who would instruct the players and umpires.
“Shoeb would take bets. He would instruct Kolu, the umpire, to signal fours and sixes. Kolu would alert the batsman and the baller. Next, the baller would deliver a slow ball, enabling the batsman to hit it for a four or a six”, revealed the Police officer.
“The cameramen would pan the cameras towards the sky to show that the ball was nowhere in sight. Next, they would zoom into the umpire who would signal a six. The cameramen ensured there were no zoom-outs,” he added.
A short clip of the Fake IPL match later surfaced on social media.