Former India Test cricketer Manoj Prabhakar says he would prefer to wait and see how the Board of Control for Cricket in India reacts in the case of Ajay Jadeja, who was cleared off match-fixing charges by the Delhi high court earlier this week.
Speaking to rediff.com in Delhi, Prabhakar said merely dropping charges does not mean that Jadeja has been absolved of wrongdoing.
"I would like to see what action the BCCI takes on this matter," he said.
Asked how he would feel if Jadeja is allowed to return to the Indian team, Prabhakar, who had blown the whistle in the match-fixing scandal by declaring that cricket icon Kapil Dev had offered him 2.5 million to throw a match in 1994, said: "If Jadeja plays for India then I should be the team manager."
He refused to comment whether his efforts to expose his former teammates have gone down the drain as some of them have been given clean chits.
Meanwhile, former CBI officer K Madhavan, who had been appointed by the BCCI to investigate the match-fixing charges on the basis the CBI interim report, said he is not at all upset with the ruling of the Delhi high court.
He said the high court has all the powers to overturn his findings.
"For everything there is higher authority. The Delhi high court has turned down my findings, but I must clarify here some points: I was not working in the capacity of a police officer and, hence, I did not have powers to summon private witnesses because they did not come under the preview of the BCCI, who had appointed me.
"I went by the CBI report because I felt that this was the guiding factor for me. I had no reason to doubt the findings of the CBI. They had recorded the statements of private persons and that was good enough for me. We had given a fair chance to all the cricketers to clear their names and it was only after talking to them that I submitted my findings. And it was the BCCI who imposed a ban on the players," Madhavan said.
On Tuesday, the BCCI indicated they are in no hurry to welcome Jadeja back. BCCI chief Jagmohan Dalmiya said: "We are given to understand that the award [the high court ruling] will be enforceable only after 90 days from the date of its receipt. The BCCI would use the entire period to discuss the extremely sensitive issue with its decision-making working committee."
Dalmiya also did not rule out appealing against the decision.
"In the interim 90 days the BCCI will obtain legal opinion and ascertain if the legal validity of the award should be tested or not," he said.
