Sri Lanka arrests Jaffna co-owner Manjot Kalra over alleged bid to bribe player

COLOMBO: Sri Lankan police arrested Manjot Kalra, an Indian co-owner of a Lanka Premier League team, on Friday over allegations that he tried to bribe a player shortly before the tournament’s opening match.

Inspector Supun Vidanage of the Sports Investigation Unit said Kalra was taken into custody at a hotel in Colombo while he was about to pay a player 9.5 million Sri Lankan rupees, or about $28,700. Vidanage said the player had informed police after being approached around 10 days earlier, though he did not identify the cricketer. He added that Kalra would be produced before a magistrate soon.

Kalra is a co-owner of the Jaffna team in the Lanka Premier League, whose sixth edition was scheduled to begin on Friday night in Colombo with a match between Jaffna and Galle. The arrest came just hours before the start of the domestic T20 competition.

The league has faced corruption-related controversy before. In January, a Sri Lankan court gave British team owner Tamim Rahman, who owns Dambulla Thunders and is Bangladesh-born, a four-year prison term suspended for five years after he admitted attempting to influence a player and arrange betting. He was also fined 24 million rupees. That conviction was made under Sri Lanka’s 2019 law aimed at curbing corruption in sport.