The Delhi and District Cricket Association continued to court controversy with the Indian cricket board barring 22 of its players from participating in age-group tournaments because of allegations of age fraud. The Indian cricket board’s game development manager Ratnakar Shetty advised the DDCA against fielding these players till a clearer picture was obtained about their age. An FIR had been filed in the IP Extention police station with regard to the allegations of age fraud.

Shetty’s letter came following an enquiry from DDCA vice president Chetan Chauhan to the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) on whether or not to field the cricketers against whom FIRs had been filed.

“I had written to the BCCI yesterday (Tuesday) on whether or not we should field these cricketers in our age-group teams. Two of those against whom the FIR has been filed were part of the Under-19 team. So we did not want a scenario where they were part of the Playing XI and then there is further trouble. Hence I sought the advice from the BCCI. We are not targeting a particular player but as an FIR has been filed we have to check with the BCCI,” Chauhan said.

DDCA president Sneh Bansal said that the players who were part of the team but were barred from participating by the BCCI would be replaced by others. “We have received an intimation from the BCCI that we cannot select these 22 boys in the state age-group teams as there was an FIR lodged against these cricketers for disputed birth certificates. Accordingly, the BCCI has instructed to select new boys in their places. We will do so as per the BCCI instructions,” Bansal was quoted as saying.

‘Legalised corruption’

Kirti Azad, who had filed the FIR, said that there was legalised corruption happenning in the DDCA. “I had filed FIRs against 12 cricketers. In fact, I got their original birth certificates from MCD and had sent it to BCCI. We all know that DDCA is a den of legalised corruption,” Azad said.

It was learnt that DDCA had today called back two of its U-19 cricketers Harsh Tyagi and Manjyot Kalra, who had gone to play a Cooch Behar Trophy match. Another U-19 cricketer who had been named as a stand-bye—Samar Seth—also was removed from the list.

“Once the police clearance is given we will see which of the boys are eligible to play and we will then approach the BCCI to remove the sanction on them,” Chauhan added.

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