Abhijit Sathe/Mumbai Mirror
Mumbai, Mar 24: When the Sharad Pawar-led BCCI regime in 2006 accused Jagmohan Dalmiya, who ruled Indian cricket for over a decade, of misusing BCCI funds from a bank account opened during the 1996 World Cup, a belligerent 'Jaggu' Dalmiya had challenged the Board to provide documentary evidence to substantiate its charges. Now, the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of Mumbai police apparently has got that documentary proof.
The EOW, which recently completed its investigations into Dalmiya's role in the case, has found him guilty of misappropriation of BCCI funds to the tune of Rs 2.90 crore.
The EOW will file a charge sheet in the Sessions Court on March 26 holding Dalmiya guilty of cheating (Section 420 of Indian Penal Code), criminal breach of trust (Section 408 of IPC), and conspiracy (Section 120-b of IPC). His secretary K M Choudhary and one Gautam Dutta have also been named in the chargesheet, it is learnt.
While the EOW has informed the BCCI about its findings, defence sources too said they were aware of the charge sheet and added that Dalmiya has been asked to be present in court on March 26. Depending on the case made out against him, the court will decide whether to extend his bail or arrest him.
The case pertains to account number 1223 opened at the Bhowanipore (West Bengal) branch of Indian Overseas Bank (IOB) when India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka jointly hosted the 1996 World Cup. Dalmiya was authorised to operate this account along with the Pakistan Cricket Board.
After the World Cup, PILCOM (Pakistan-India-Lanka Committee, the organising committee comprising officials from the three countries) faced a number of Income-Tax cases in India. The committee then decided that the IOB account would be used only to meet expenses to fight these cases and authorised Dalmiya to operate the account for this purpose.
In 2006, when Pawar was elected BCCI president, Dalmiya stepped down and closed the IOB account. Soon after, BCCI asked Dalmiya to provide an account of funds spent from the account. BCCI alleged Dalmiya had used Rs 21.74 lakh from the account for his personal use.
An FIR was lodged against Dalmiya, ex-Board secretary S K Nair, treasurers Jyoti Vajpayee and Kishore Rungta, Dalmiya's secretary K M Choudhary and one Gautam Dutta, besides the manager of IOB's Bhowanipore branch. An EOW official who did not wish to be named said the probe by the Wing has now revealed:
1) Bills for eight telephones were cleared from the bank account, out of which two were registered in the name of Dalmiya's firms, while one was registered in the name of Dalmiya's mother.
2) Payments worth Rs 39 lakh were made to S K Traders, a firm floated by one Gautam Dutta, for the purchase of stationery, supply of taxis to BCCI etc. However, the EOW has found that Dutta's firm was neither a stationery or transport firm, nor had it outsourced the job. The firm could not provide documents to support its claims.
3) Money was spent from the account to arrange travel, hotel stay and local transport for Dalmiya. Again, the EOW could not find bills or documents showing details of these expenses, EOW officials said.
4) According to EOW sources, when the BCCI functioned from Kolkata during Dalmiya's tenure, no account of expenses was maintained about the account at the Board's office. Although in their statements, Dalmiya and others claimed that BCCI had authorised use of the PILCOM account for travel expenses and to settle hotel bills, even documents showing such resolutions were not available.
"We found that even though Dalmiya alone was authorised to operate the IOB PILCOM account, his secretary K M Choudhary was allowed to operate it to withdraw money," said an EOW official.
"During scrutiny of the account, we came across payments to the tune of Rs 35 crore made in connection with I-T cases. We did not investigate them as the account was meant to fund expenses arising out of these cases. We concentrated on other transactions," said the official. The EOW has so far not come acrosss any evidence to suggest the involvement of Nair, Vajpayee, Rungta and the bank branch manager in the case. However, it has not absolved them yet as investigations into their role are still on, EOW sources said. Additional commissioner (EOW), Mumbai police, Sadanand Date said, "Investigations into certain charges have been completed and we will inform the court about our findings soon."