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Videos produced to back Prabhakar allegations

As we write this, Manoj Prabhakar has just finished addressing a media conference at the Hotel Meridien, in New Delhi.

And it is the most explosive one yet, with the former all-rounder producing videotapes -- repeat, videotapes -- of conversations with Jaywant Lele, Ravi Shastri, Sunil Gavaskar, and former India manager Amrit Mathur, among others.

The videos, right off the bat, would appear to nail Lele to the mast. Just this morning, the BCCI secretary had claimed that the audiotapes aired by Prabhakar a day previously were doctored. Now, that has been rebutted by Lele, large as life, speaking on video of his belief that Azharuddin, Jadeja and Kapil Dev are all involved in match-fixing.

The Lele portion of the conversation runs as follows:

Prabhakar: Sir you know the person?

Lele: Yeah, I know the person, now I'm telling you one to one, in this team the top person is Sachin. Now I will tell you something. This is a fact. 200 per cent fact. I was told about this, the moment it happened. This is related to India versus New Zealand match in Sri Lanka. Earlier day at night...6.30...said, 'You are losing tomorrow...New Zealand will win the match, Jadeja and Azhar will be run out.'

Prabhakar: Where was that, in Sri Lanka?

Lele: In India. It was a qualifying match.

Prabhakar: Which was the other team?

Lele: Sri Lanka. Then Angshuman [Gaekwad] couldn't believe his ears. He said, 'What are you talking? We have beaten Sri Lanka, we have beaten New Zealand once. There is no question about losing. We will beat them hands down.' He said, `No, I'm telling you it's a fact. You want to be a party to it?' He abused him and put the phone down. Then at 2 o'clock in the night, this was at 12 in the night, he was not able to get sleep. So at 2 o'clock at night he went to Sachin's room. He told him this and this happened on the phone. 'What do you feel about it? Somebody said we are not going to win.' He said, 'I will snatch an Indian victory.' You will not believe, whatever was decided everything happened exactly. Azharuddin was run out. Jadeja was run out. But Sachin saw to it that India won the game. And we reached the final. The final was against Sri Lanka. We have never ever won the match against Sri Lanka in Sri Lanka. In the night the same person rang. He said, 'I don't know what happened yesterday...but you won the game. But tomorrow India is definitely not going to win. Sri Lanka is going to be champions.' Anshuman again went to Sachin. Told him the same thing. And we won again. Two consecutive matches.

Prabhakar: Man, all alone?

Lele: He is all alone. All this you are telling openly. I don't have any proof so what will I say. Each and every person who is at the top end of the board is aware. So there are three persons. Azhar, Jadeja and Kapil.

Prabhakar: Azhar...

Lele: ...Jadeja, and Kapil Dev. What is Jadeja, is all Kapil.

Prabhakar: Sir, everybody knows...

Lele: But I don't have any proof...

Prabhakar: Sir why have you taken him as a coach then?

Lele: That was the biggest mistake. Let me tell you. I can swear by my wife. I told Dalmiya. I said this is the third consecutive mistake you are doing. You will realise you are making a mistake. I said two mistakes I have pointed out to you.

In a later portion, the conversation continues, with Dalmiya joining in:

Lele: Upto September he (Kapil) will be there. We will review his contract then.

Prabhakar: In September?

Lele: What he was saying na, whatever review we will do we will do in September.

Prabhakar: Sir, he has to be the one?

Lele: Now, what is it. If he's (Kapil) thinking himself guilty...morally he should resign. We can do only when something will come up. Somebody will come up and say `Yes I am the party. Who not only offered, but I have given. I have given some money in the past. If something like this comes then we will kick out the bastards. I am totally...

Dalmiya: Really, I am getting really really disgusted. And I feel that probably after two months, make a statement saying this is why I am going out... and this is what is happening, and this is what it is. I will not allow any good people to come in. Really what Kapil is saying, `stop the cricket'...whether it is...If everybody is saying present cricketers are thieves then what right do they have to don India colours. Kapil is going in a different direction, but what is coming from my inside is after two months I don't know. I may tell them, 'Why are you playing, because you are a controversial figure how are you representing India?'

Prabhakar: They didn't give the follow-on, sir.

Lele: Do you know what happened?

Prabhakar: No sir.

Lele: " You will not believe, whatever was decided everything happened exactly. Azharuddin was run out. Jadeja was run out."

Cut

Lele: Me and Chandu Borde went to him [Kapil]. 'In another 10-15 minutes they will be all out. If they are out 20 minutes early then there will be 10 minutes more play. You take their wickets now why are you prolonging the innings?' Know what he said? He said, 'Gentlemen, I don't want to. We have fielded for a long time. We will rest for two hours. We will score 200 runs in two hours. 100-150 runs later, after making 500 runs we will give them the batting.' Chandu Borde said, 'What? You must give follow-on, what are you talking?'

Know what he said?

'No, No, I want to bat again.' He said this! Nobody was ready to believe me. Then Sachin met me. Sachin said, 'We are going to make them follow-on...what are you talking?' Can you believe him telling me this? I met Sachin. I asked him `What happened?' He said, 'No, the coach insisted that we should bat. And he asked me to go at number three.'

I asked, 'You agreed?'

He said, 'What can I do? He told me this is how everybody thinks. Sachin you go and tell them we are batting.' In the evening the press ask him (Kapil) he quietly says, 'It is not my decision, it is the captain's decision.'

Prabhakar: Oh shit! And Sachin...Sachin didn't say anything?

Lele: It is on record.

Lele: That AJ is there. AJ. He got Rs 40-50 lakh for follow-on.

Prabhakar: The one who stays with Kapil?

Lele: Yes.

Ravi Shastri speaks, on video, of how Azhar, during the Titan Cup in 1996, Azhar was sitting in the Shamiana, the coffee shop attached to the Taj Mahal Hotel, Mumbai. Alongside him is Pappu Butani, wearing a pricey watch. Shastri tells Prabhakar of how Azhar admired the watch, asked its price and when told that it was Rs 600,000, went up to his room and returned a few minutes later with that amount in cash, in a bag, and promptly purchased the watch.

Shastri also says that he vividly remembers Prabhakar telling him of Kapil's offer, way back in 1994, in Sri Lanka on the morning of the final.

The Sunil Gavaskar conversation is relatively innocuous, in that it has the former India captain telling Manoj about how match-fixing is rampant in Indian cricket, and how the BCCI authorities have been turning a blind eye to the issue, for their own reasons. Gavaskar, however, adds on tape that he does not remember Prabhakar mentioning any name.

Amrit Mathur speaks of the circumstances in which Kapil Dev was once gifted an expensive car. And more to the point, says that he too remembers Prabhakar telling him of the Kapil Dev offer.

Former Indian physio Dr Ali Irani is shown saying that he had learnt of the Kapil incident from Mohammad Azharuddin (which, as was pointed out during the press conference, backs up Manoj Prabhakar's statement that he had at the time told Azhar about the offer).

Other comments come from:

Prashant Vaidya (The player who said that Prabhakar's evidence was wrong, and he was not a privy to anything that happened between Prabhakar and Kapil Dev, says on video): "What an actor he (Kapil Dev) is... many people come to me and I say, "Paaji has got an offer from Subhash Ghai... I have never seen such a great actor!"

Jagmohan Dalmiya, the man who says there is no match-fixing in cricket, says: "...The second thing you are saying is, if all this is happening then where is the money going? Some will take it in their friend's name, some in their employees' name, somebody in somebody else's name. Nobody is going to take it in his own name."

Bishen Singh Bedi: "I've said that everybody's involved. Azhar is involved, Jadeja is involved, Kapil is involved. I'm saying that there are three properties in Azhar's name, where did they come from?"

Nayan Mongia, who had the room next to Prabhakar during the fateful Lanka tour: "That is why those four players in the suites went out (of the team) at that time. There was so much noise that everyone noticed. First you (Manoj) went out of the team, then Sherry (Navjot Sidhu), then Prashant went."

I S Bindra, who is told by Prabhakar that his then manager, Wadekar, had complained to Dalmiya: "Dalmiya is obviously a party to all this. He never brought it to my notice."

Kiran More: "Ajay Sharma came back from that tour... he was in the team for a year after that. Things started from there only."

Sanjay Manjrekar: "But let me tell you the truth -- God is here -- over the last 1-2 years, all these stories have started coming to me. I was such a fool at the time."

As a prelude to airing a 45-minute documentary, a transcript of which can be read on www.tehelka.com, Prabhakar said: "I am grateful to everyone who has come here today. After today, I will perhaps have no friends left in Indian cricket. But my goal is not to target anyone, but to clean up cricket. If today, I didn't do what I am going to do, I too will be guilty of covering up. My fight is against all those who are ruining cricket. If they don't take me back into cricket circles, I have no regrets. I have not done any crime. You are going to see a 45-minute documentary. The idea behind it is not to hurt anyone, not to cause grief to anyone. I hoped that, as Hansie Cronje had done, Indian players too would come forward, admit their wrongdoing and try to make amends. I gave them time to do that. But unfortunately, no one has. And barring Ravi Shastri, no one came forward to back me up. I hope that today is the beginning of a clean up. I request the assembled media to speak of what they know -- we cannot continue to hide the truth any longer."

Meanwhile, asked for his reaction, Kapil Dev's advocate V N Koura said that he had not yet got hold of the tapes, but from what he has read in the media, he does not see any real evidence of Kapil Dev's alleged offer of a bribe to Manoj Prabhakar.

Interestingly, Prabhakar's lawyer Nidesh Gupta revealed that this is merely the tip of a mammoth iceberg, and that the entire videotapes run to a phenomenal 50 hours.

Prabhakar tapes unveiled -- Lele implicates Azhar, Jadeja, Kapil