Last Sunday, the twin news of Yash's death and the match-fixing drama in the Maidan sent ripples across Bengal. It's the tragic death of young Yash that is hogging the headlines though. Two days after the Class II student's body was found near an abandoned factory off Foreshore Road in Howrah, about 15 km from Kolkata, the police are now learnt to be investigating into possibilities of whether the Lakhotia family's shady connection with cricket betting had led to the kid's kidnapping and eventual death.

Howrah SP Neeraj Kumar Singh guardedly said they were keeping all their options open while looking into the case. "We are looking at all options in this case, and the matter of match-fixing involvement is one of them," he told this daily.

Yash's uncle, the late Arun Lakhotia, is suspected to be the key in this murder case. Arun is learnt to have been deeply enmeshed in the illegal cricket betting racket. Back in 2003 during the cricket World Cup, he was picked up by the Kolkata Police for running an illegal betting racket in central Kolkata, and later died.

In February 2003, three bookies -- Rajesh Agarwal, Arun Jain and Arun Lakhotia -- were picked up from an apartment on Hariram Goenka Street. Arun Lakhotia was detained in his Nagerbazar residence. He fell ill after alleged torture in custody and had to be hospitalised, where he succumbed to injuries. Two police officers of Posta police were suspended for allegedly torturing him.

Meanwhile, Yash's father Anil Lakhotia, who runs a popular sweetshop in Howrah, is learnt to have been very close to underworld don Santosh Singh. Santosh's brother-in-law Ganesh Choudhary, who was working at Anil Lakhotia's sweetshop, has been arrested in connection with the murder of Yash. The police, however, clarified that any row over the match fixing booty between Lakhotia and interested parties is just one of the angles being probed. The actual murder motive is yet to be ascertained.

Meanwhile, the other match-fixing drama in town involves two respected first-division Kolkata clubs Bhukailash Sporting Club and Ballygunge United. After the drawn result and score-sheet of the two-day league match between the two sides drew charges of match-fixing, a top functionary of the Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB) has openly confessed that match-fixing has always been a part and parcel of the Maidan and that it's still commonplace.

Later, CAB president Jagmohan Dalmiya tried to play down the incident.

Questions were raised over how Ballygunge bowlers could have possibly completed 73 overs in a span of just over three hours on the second day of the league match on Sunday at the YMCA ground. Many in the Maidan suspect that the two clubs and match scorers contrived to fudge the scores.