Former Delhi police boss calls for strong fixing law

	Neeraj Kumar (right) wants the judicial system to come hard at fixers © AFP Enlarge
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Neeraj Kumar, the former Delhi police commissioner, has called for a strong anti-fixing law to be instituted in India to act as a deterrent for corruption in cricket. It was during Kumar's watch that the Delhi police unearthed the spot-fixing scandal involving three Rajasthan Royals cricketers - Sreesanth, Ankit Chavan and Ajit Chandila - in the 2013 season of the IPL.

"A strong anti-fixing law will act as a deterrent. It should be a penal law. The fixers and those who get 'fixed' should both be sent to jail," he told Times of India. "Is banning three cricketers the end of the matter? Isn't there a need to look further? Could there be an in-house investigation, brain-storming which ensures that it doesn't happen again, and the IPL too gets its credibility back? Is it happening? It is not."

Kumar said the police had evidence on the cricketers, who were charged under the Indian Penal Code sections 420 and 120B, which deal with fraud, cheating, and criminal conspiracy. "If the evidence we have is properly pursued in a court of law, it may end in conviction," he said. "However, sometimes, trials go on and on, new police officers come and they aren't that keen that the investigation is done properly. The nature of our criminal justice system is also such that it can be time-consuming."