Five held for betting on India-Australia match

The city police today claimed to have busted an inter-state betting racket with the arrest of five persons for allegedly accepting bets on the fifth and final One-Day International between India and Australia. Acting on a tip-off, the Commissioner's Task Force (East Zone) Team yesterday conducted simultaneous raids at three different places in Sultan Bazar area here and busted the racket where in one M Santosh along with his associates organised betting business and were illegally earning money, a release from Hyderabad Police said. The fifth ODI was played at the Sydney cricket ground yesterday where India outplayed Australia by six wickets, but lost the five match series 4-1. Police also seized 14 cell phones and Rs 1.25 lakh cash from them. The accused were identified M Santosh, M Vinod, Shyam Sunder K, Arun Sharma and Ashish Agarwal. Santosh was running the racket from his house and accepted betting over cell phones from punters and his close friends in an organised manner in Hyderabad during cricket matches, it said. He received update of match betting ratio information on his phone from one Agarwal of Delhi, who is absconding, the release added.