Will interim report mark another Black Friday?

Friday seems to be an inauspicious day for cricket ever since the match-fixing scam was unearthed. The scandal first broke on a Friday, April 7. Ever since that Black Friday, match-fixing has become a part of life for fans the world over and a couple of momentous happenings in the case have occurred on Friday. One has been hearing of allegations and counter allegations, denials and inquiries, charges and investigative agencies. But so far there have been very few prosecutions, even though some other players have been fined.

Now the scene shifts temporarily from India to South Africa with the King Commission expected to submit its interim report again on a Friday. All eyes are on the report which will be handed over to the South African Sports Minister Ngconde Balfour and Justice Penuell Maduna. The report will be made available to the public only after the South African President Thabo Mbeki looks at it. The second round of hearings are expected to resume in October.

In the first round, former South African captain Hansie Cronje admitted that he accepted money from bookies to provide information but denied having fixed any matches. His team mates Herschelle Gibbs, Henry Williams and Pieter Strydom all said that they were offered bribes by the former captain to under perform.

The commission ended its first round of hearings on June 26 and was expected to submit a report on June 30. But this was postponed to August 11. Explaining the delay, Commission secretary John Bacon said "The extension has been necessitated by the volume of work involved in the preparation of the interim report."

Meanwhile, IT authorities in India dismissed reports that Indian player Ajay Jadeja was summoned for questioning on Wednesday. PTI sources close to the department in New Delhi said "he was not questioned yesterday and we have deferred the process to a later date." Earlier, Jadeja too had denied the reports that appeared in the media.

Summing up, there has been plenty of drama during the "Hansiegate" scam in India. It started with the Delhi police stumbling upon the phone conversations. Then the drama intensified with IS Bindra pointing the finger towards Kapil Dev. This was followed by the former Indian captain's tearful interview, Manoj Prabhakar's sensational clandestine video, the events prior to making public the Qayyum and Chandrachud reports, the sensational disclosures made by the South African players and finally Cronje's tearful farewell from the King Commission. As if all this was not enough, came the CBI inquiry and the raids by income tax authorities. Now the action shifts back to South Africa. Will the interim report add more fuel to the fire or will it be a damp squib? The answer will be known in the next few days.