Indian Punter League: The True Story of the Fake IPL

By Abhishek Bhatt

THE RIVETING STORY OF A FAKE IPL SCAM THAT SPANNED THE GLOBE—FROM MOSCOW TO MEHSANA AND BACK.
Young and ambitious Faizal Ahmed has one goal in life—he wants to get rich, and he wants to get rich fast. When an outrageous idea strikes him one day, in a gambling den in Moscow, Faizal knows it could be his ticket to big money. The catch? He has to partner with a mobster and convince Russian gamblers to place high-stakes bets on cricket, a sport they neither watch nor understand. But a challenge is only a veiled opportunity, right?
Cheerfully unscrupulous and entirely self-assured, Faizal prepares to set up the scam of his life. Hawala money, clandestine meetings, discreet text channels, rookie players, camera crews and live streams beaming across the world—this is a con job that spans the globe, from Moscow to Mehsana and back. Based on a true incident, Indian Punter League unravels the story of an audacious con where a group of small-time conmen managed to dupe seasoned Russian gamblers by staging a fake IPL. A story so wildly improbable, it seems impossible for it to be true. Only, it is.