Court orders FIR against Pawar

A court in Hyderabad has ordered an FIR to be lodged against Sharad Pawar, the Indian board president, and the secretary, Nirajan Shah, among others, for alleged misappropriation of funds from tickets sold for the recent ODI between Australia and India in the city.

The third metropolitan magistrate of Cyberabad issued the order, acting on a complaint from a former member of the Rajya Sabha, P Radhakrishna. He contended that 24,000 tickets had been sold at a premium while 15,000 had been made available to the general public and that Rs 12 crore (approximately US$3,000,000) had been misappropriated in the process.

Besides Pawar and Shah, the court ordered FIRs against G Vinod and Shivlal Yadav, the president and secretary of the Hyderabad Cricket Association.

Australia won the match, played on October 5 at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium, by 47 runs.