Lalit Modi sparks another round of murky allegations, says 2009 IPL auctions were rigged

Former Indian Premier League (IPL) commissioner Lalit Modi has sparked another round of murky allegations when he told a TV channel that TV channel that the 2009 IPL auctions were rigged to enable Chennai Super Kings (CSK) to retain England all-rounder Andrew Flintoff, reports the newspapers.

Modi's statements seemed to lend credence to Sahara boss Subrata Roy's claim that the IPL lacked a level-playing field and rules were tweaked to favour influential teams.  Roy's group recently pulled out of sponsoring the Indian cricket team and also withdrew from the IPL, in which it owned a team, following "long-term" differences with the BCCI over the IPL.

But according to a report in The Times Of India, sources who have worked 'very closely with Lalit Modi point out that Modi himself was responsible for most of them, thanks to his "own vested interests" and "family connections" in the game.  "All that happened when he was the IPL Commissioner. He chose to ignore them at that time because of his own interests," says a senior franchise officer. "Today, he's blaming Srinivasan (BCCI president).

Meanhile BCCI president N Srinivasan rubbished Lalit Modi's claim that the 2009 IPL auction of Andrew Flintoff was rigged and said that the former Commissioner was only seeking "publicity" by making such baseless statements, reports TOI. "I haven't watched the television programme where he (Modi) has said all this. All I can state is that, there is absolutely no substance or truth in what he is saying," Srinivasan said on Tuesday.