Arguably the darkest day in the history of the IPL occurred in May 2013, shortly after the Mumbai Indians had beaten the Rajasthan Royals at a match at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai.
Raghu Iyer, the CEO of the Royals, was asleep in his hotel room when the duty manager called him to tell him that a contingent from the Delhi Police were downstairs. They were on the verge of arresting three Rajasthan players on charges of spot-fixing.
The police produced their warrant and then explained in detail the evidence they had against S. Sreesanth, Ajit Chandila, and Ankeet Chavan.
Iyer just had time to contact the Royals captain Rahul Dravid and coach Paddy Upton and reach the franchise owners who were in London at the time, before the news went public.
The media went into hyper-drive. Rumours of other cricketers being involved were soon circulating. Every match in the IPL that year fell under a cloud of suspicion with taints of alleged corruption, and the BCCI were backed into a corner.
The Royals immediately suspended the contracts of the three players in question. They were banned from further involvement in the tournament whilst the investigation was conducted. A number of bookmakers was also arrested.
According to the police, Chandila was the ringleader. He confessed to spot-fixing and also to trying to enlist the help of the others at the behest of the bookies.
Meanwhile, in a separate case, Mumbai Police arrested a number of people, including Gurunath Meiyappan, the Principal of the Chennai Super Kings, for alleged illegal betting.
In 2015, Sreesanth, Chandila and Chavan were cleared of all the charges by a lower court. However, the following January, the BCCI handed Chandila a life ban from all forms of cricket. A similar ban imposed on Sreesanth was lifted by the Supreme Court three years ago.
Meanwhile, India Cements and Jaipur IPL, the owners of Chennai Super Kings and the Royals respectively, were given two-year bans, in 2017 and 2018. They were temporarily replaced by two new teams, Gujarat Lions and Rising Pune Supergiants.