DISGRACED cricketer Ajay Sharma will not return as Padiham's professional next season after Indian Cricket chiefs imposed a life ban for match fixing.

Sharma, and former India team-mate Mohammed Azharuddin, was banned by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) who concluded that a damning report into match-fixing proved that Sharma, who had always protested his innocence, had been involved.

Ajay Jadeja, Manoj Prabhakar and the Indian team's former physiotherapist Ali Irani have all received five-year bans. Wicketkeeper Nayan Mongia was cleared.

It is not known whether the players will appeal.

Jennings Ribblesdale League club Padiham signed 38-year-old Sharma just before the accusations of match fixing arose in April of this year.

After a successful season the club offered Sharma a new contract for 2001 on the assumption that the player would be cleared.

It is thought the club were adopting a 'wait-and-see policy' but after this week's announcement they are reportedly back in the hunt for a new pro.

Sharma's ban only applies to Indian first-class and international cricket so, in theory, he is free to play in Britain.

But work permit rules state that a professional with a league cricket club must have played five first class matches in his own country the previous season before he receives a work permit.

Sharma's ban means he has played just one first class match this season.

And the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), who carried out the initial investigation into the scandal and whose report has been used as the foundation for the bans, had hinted that they would write to other cricket boards to recommend that they not allow Sharma, or any of the others named in the report, to play in their country.

Acting on the report, the cricket Board appointed former CBI Joint Director K Madhavan as its anti-corruption commissioner and asked him to further probe the CBI findings.

Padiham's professional was finally over last night when the Indian cricketer received a life ban from cricket.

The Jennings Ribblesdale League club had offered the all-rounder a new contract for next season, despite the allegatiuons of match-fixing, which he had denied.

The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) CHENNAI: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) on Tuesday slapped a life ban on former cricket captain Mohammed

Azharuddin and Ajay Sharma, and suspended Ajay Jadeja and Manoj Prabhakar for five years in connection with the match-fixing scandal.

BCCI President A C Muthiah told reporters after a meeting of the Board's disciplinary committee here that the former physiotherapist of the Indian team, Ali Irani, had also been suspended for five years.

Wicketkeeper Nayan Mongia was exonerated, Muthiah said.

The players have been given a chance to appeal to the Board against the punishment, he added.

The verdict is the culmination of the betting and match-fixing scandal that was exposed on April 7, with the Delhi police announcing that the then South Africa captain, Hansie Cronje, was involved in deals with bookies.

Then came the summer of discontent for Indian cricket, with Manoj Prabhakar naming Kapil Dev as the man who offered him Rs 25 lakh to underperform in a one-dayer in Sri Lanka in 1994.

The crisis snowballed after Prabhakar made secret tapes, in which more names, including that of Azhar, came up.

With pressure mounting all around, the sports ministry asked the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) to investigate the matter. The first round of interrogation by the CBI led to the names of other cricketers -- Ajay Jadeja, Ajay Sharma, Nayan Mongia and Prabhakar himself, besides that of Ali Irani -- cropping up.

After nearly six months of investigations, during which all the cricketers named were questioned, some more than once, the CBI came out with an exhaustive report on betting and match-fixing.

The report found no evidence against Kapil Dev but named five cricketers -- Azhar, Jadeja, Sharma, Prabhakar, Mongia -- and physio Irani as also nine foreign players.

Acting on the report, the cricket Board appointed former CBI Joint Director K Madhavan as its anti-corruption commissioner and asked him to further probe the CBI findings.

Madhavan, in his report submitted to the Board on November 25, confirmed the CBI's conclusions on all concerned, except Mongia, whom he exonerated.

The Board's three-member disciplinary committee, after studying the Madhavan report, recommended a life ban on Azhar and Sharma and five-year suspension of Jadeja, Prabhakar and Irani, while letting off Mongia.

In New Delhi, Minister for Youth Affairs and Sports Uma Bharati said that the BCCI decision to punish tainted cricketers had been taken under its regulations'' and the government would now look into the entire

gamut of match-fixing to put an end to the scourge.

She said a meeting would be held in the next two-three days with BCCI officials on the issue as there is no doubt now that match-fixing exists in Indian cricket''.

Talking to reporters after a meeting of the Union Cabinet, she said she had come under no pressure at any stage from Defence Minister George Fernandes for showing leniency to Ajay Jadeja, one of the four cricketers punished by the BCCI.

Meanwhile, the CBI has termed as "unfortunate" the reported comment

of BCCI Vice-President Kamal Morarka that the agency's report on cricket and match-fixing read like "a prostitute's diary".

Asked to comment on the statement, highly placed CBI sources said in New Delhi on Tuesday: "It was unfortunate and uncalled for."

They said, We have done our job up to the mark without any bias but it seems that such statements from him are to shield someone.''

Asked whether the CBI was contemplating suing him for his reported

allegation that the agency was the "most corrupt organisation", they said "so far he has been building castles in the air, let him name anyone as corrupt ... We will drag him to the court of law."

Asked about the meeting between CBI officials and the three-member anti-corruption team of the International Cricket Council (ICC) on Monday, the sources said they were here again to mainly investigate the role of foreign players.

The three-member team, comprising Martin Hawkins, Alan Peacock and Robert Smanney, met CBI officials, including Joint Director R N Sawani, for nearly two hours on Monday.

The 162-page CBI report names ex-captains Alec Stewart (England), Brian Lara (West Indies), Hansie Cronje (South Africa), Arjuna Ranatunga and Arvinda d'Silva (Sri Lanka), Martin Crowe (New

Zealand) and Asif Iqbal and Salim Malik (Pakistan). Apart from the former skippers, the names of two more Australian players -- Mark Waugh and Dean Jones -- also figured in the CBI report.