Suspended IPL boss Lalit Modi has urged cricket fans to give him time to clear his name, maintaining his defiant stance over corruption allegations that have overshadowed the lucrative tournament.
The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), which owns the Indian Premier League, suspended Modi over claims of corruption, tax evasion and money-laundering that have sparked a government investigation.
"I am still Chairman of IPL. Just suspended. Wait – we have just begun," he wrote on microblogging website Twitter late on Monday.
Modi, 46, was also removed as a BCCI Vice-President and as Chairman of the T20 Champions League, a separate club tournament organised jointly by India, Australia and South Africa.
He has been given 15 days to reply to the allegations put to him by the BCCI, which will then conduct its own probe to be completed in six months.
In a previous Twitter post, Modi threatened to "reveal the men who have tried to bring disrepute to the game".
BCCI chief Shashank Manohar, asked if he was worried about Modi spilling the beans, responded: "If there are others also involved in wrongdoing, they too will be punished.
"We will not spare anyone," he said. "The IPL is a very valuable property for us and it needs to present a clean image."
The IPL – based on the shortened Twenty20 format and modelled partly on English football's Premier League – has attracted the sport's top international stars. Modi ran the event like a one-man show from its inception three years ago, raising fears that without him the multi-billion-dollar tournament could suffer from lack of direction.
The BCCI has moved quickly to try to ensure continuity. Businessman Chirayu Amin, one of five BCCI Vice-Presidents and a veteran cricket administrator, was appointed to head the tournament's governing council as interim chief.
Modi, the scion of a wealthy Indian business family which owns, among others, the Godfrey Phillips cigarette company, will not be short of work if he is kept out of the BCCI.