Daily Times

LAHORE: An independent adjudicator has increased the ban on Pakistan’s World Twenty20-winning opener Shahzaib Hasan from one year to four on appeal from the Pakistan Cricket Board’s (PCB) on Friday. On February 28, an anti-corruption tribunal formed by the PCB had slapped Hasan with a one-year ban and Rs one million fine after finding him guilty of violating the PCB’s code of conduct during the second season of the Pakistan Super League. Having already served the original ban, Hasan, 28, via his appeal to an independent adjudicator, had wanted to free himself from the monetary fine. The PCB had appealed the length of the ban, saying it was too lenient. “The review appeals of both the parties were heard by independent adjudicator Justice Hamid, who gave the verdict in the board’s favour, and turned Hasan’s original one-year ban into four. Our position was that Hasan should be banned for more than a year because he had violated three clauses,” said the PCB’s legal adviser. “Today our position was accepted.” The adjudicator also upheld the Rs1m fine on Hasan.

Spot-fixing refers to illegal activity in a sport where a specific part of a game is fixed, unlike match-fixing, where the whole result is fixed. Hasan is one of six players sanctioned in the spot-fixing case which rocked the second edition of Pakistan Super League last year. The PCB’s anti-corruption unit had charged Hasan for violating three clauses of its anti-corruption code: for luring cricketers into the scam, not reporting approaches by the bookies, and hiding information regarding his contacts with the bookies.

Swashbuckling opener Sharjeel Khan, Khalid Latif, Mohammad Irfan, Mohammad Nawaz, and Nasir Jamshed were also given bans of varying lengths. Jamshed is also charged with other breaches and faces a life ban, a decision likely to be announced next week. Hasan’s lawyer Kashif Rajwana said his client is likely to challenge the decision in court. Hasan played the last of his three one-day internationals for Pakistan in November 2010. He has also played in 10 Twenty20 internationals, including the World Twenty20 which Pakistan won in 2009. Hasan, like Jamshed, now lives in the UK.

Published in Daily Times, August 11^th 2018.