Vindoo Dara Singh offered to place IPL bets for hotelier during Tirupati visit

Chennai-based hotelier Vikram Agarwal on May 31 told the police that earlier this year actor Vindoo Dara Singh informed him that he was placing bets in the last IPL season on behalf of Gurunath Meiyappan, the former senior official of Chennai Super Kings and son-in-law of BCCI president N Srinivasan.

“I have known Meiyappan since 1995. On May 3, this year, at the instance of Meiyappan, I arranged for a darshan of Tirupati temple for Vindoo. Before that, I had never met Vindoo. He told me that Meiyappan placed bets through him. When I inquired Meiyappan about this (betting), he told me that he had placed bets on some matches through Vindoo and had lost the money,” Agarwal’s statement read.

Vindoo also offered to place bets for Agarwal but he refused. For the last two years, Agarwal was placing bets on cricket matches through south India-based bookie Uttam Jain, alias Kitty. Agarwal even placed bets through Kitty on 10 occasions during the IPL-6 and had won Rs 1.5 lakh through the bookie, his statement read.

“I met Kitty at a function and since then I have placed bets on at least 25 occasions through him. After the Delhi Police on May 16 arrested cricketer Sreesanth and others, in connection with spot-fixing case, I deleted Kitty’s phone number from my phone, out of fear, and never met him again,” Agarwal said in his statement.

Meiyappan was summoned by the Mumbai Police on May 23 for questioning in connection to his alleged links with the bookies.

The next day, he was arrested on charges of fraud, cheating and forgery. He was later granted bail but the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) suspended him.