City-based hotelier Vikram Aggarwal was today arrested by Crime Branch—CID of Tamil Nadu Police, which is probing the IPL betting case on charges of his links with a bookie and betting.

The arrest came at the end of a seven hour long gruelling questioning by the CB—CID in its office at Guindy here after he came under the agency’s scanner in the wake of his name surfacing in the betting scam.

CB—CID Deputy Superintendent of Police Venkataraman told reporters here that preliminary enquiry revealed that Aggarwal was closely associated with bookie Uttam C Jain, alias Kitty, who has already been arrested in the betting racket.

“Kitty was utilising a room in Hotel Radisson Blu for betting in IPL matches. In addition, Aggarwal was also into gambling,” he said.

Venkataraman elaborating on the reasons that prompted the agency to arrest Aggarwal, said the accused has confessed to having information on pitch conditions and other details on IPL matches.

Aggarwal has also made hundreds of calls using some mobile phones, the ownership of which were being probed, he said, adding CB—CID therefore decided to arrest him.

In response to the CB—CID summons, Aggarwal arrived at their office at 10.00 a.m for questioning.

His two hotels in Chennai were earlier raided after his alleged links with bookies came to light.

The hotelier, summoned by the Mumbai crime branch, had appeared before it on May 31 in connection with their separate case on IPL—betting.

Aggarwal is a friend of CSK team principal Gurunath Meiyappan, son-in-law of BCCI president N Srinivasan, who has also been arrested on similar charges.

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