Conspiracies are such fun.

Various police forces in India are running around like fox terriers with the scent of a hot vixen in their nostrils to try and implicate as many people as possible for the spot fixing scandal in the Indian Premier League. The IPL is a very short version of the game called T20 in which each side gets to bowl just 20 overs. The teams are owned by various franchises who bid for players and hence have a mix of players from several countries. Although the basic rules are the same as in test cricket in that there are 11 players in each team, 2 batsmen at the crease and 2 umpires it has other rules, along with cheerleaders from the US, making it completely different. The IPL was started by Mr Lalit Modi in 2008 and was an instant success, raking in billions of dollars. This caused a lot of burning among politicians and civil servants who see it as their birthright to control every activity in India so that they can fill their pockets and leave behind enough for the next 10 generations. So in 2009 the IPL was denied security to hold matches because of general elections even though Indians would much prefer to watch exciting IPL matches rather than vote to elect one criminal political gang over another. Mr Modi took the IPL to South Africa and made it an enormous success there so he was hounded out in 2010 and took shelter in the UK. In April, 3 players playing for the Rajasthan Royals were arrested by the Delhi police for spot fixing wherein a player, usually a bowler, signals what kind of ball he is going to bowl. This has been prearranged with bookies who have taken bets knowing what is going to happen and thus make lots of money. Players get a cut. The question is why would anyone bet on Sreesanth, who regularly gives away lots of runs anyway, and 2 others who are unknown. The police case is built on the fact that Sreesanth had a towel tucked in his waistband. With Delhi sweltering at 46'C is it any surprise if a bowler needs a towel to wipe his hand to prevent the ball slipping out? Tennis players regularly have towels tucked in their waistbands, so are all tennis players guilty of spot fixing? Several bookies have also been arrested. Yesterday the Delhi police application to hold 3 bookies for 5 more days was refused by the Chief Metropolitan Magistrate who said," It has become very clear that the same ( application ) has been drafted in a very cryptic manner. Instead of disclosing the facts, it ( police ) is hiding information from the court. It is not clear what the agency has been doing with the accused ( Dole and Bhatia ) for the past five days." Delhi Police has been under great pressure for a succession of rapes in the capital. Of course, one has nothing to do with the other. A conspiracy is so much more interesting than silly spot fixing. Isn't it?