The Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Rajasthan Royals (RR) were banned for two years from the Indian Premier League (IPL) in 2015. This is a punishment for serious offenses by the key officials of these teams.

Let's go way back to 2013. It was then that three RR players - S Sreesanth, Ankeet Chavan, and Ajit Chandila - were arrested by the Delhi Police for spot-fixing. Roughly, it meant that they were accused of losing or fixing games intentionally to pocket money

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Just a week later, N Srinivasan's son-in-law Gurunath Meiyappan was arrested by the Mumbai Police for betting and sharing insider information with bookies. This is a huge one, as the man was an important official to the team's owner, to boot.

The Supreme Court of India appointed a three-member committee, led by former Chief Justice of India R M Lodha, who probed the matter. The committee also put an end to the controversy by finding Meiyappan guilty of corrupt practices and giving him a life ban from doing any cricket-related activities.

But that wasn't all - the committee also slammed CSK's owner India Cements for not taking adequate action against Meiyappan. The panel believed that Meiyappan's actions had caused "huge injury" to the game's reputation and that the team's owner had failed to take responsibility.

As a result, CSK and RR were banned from the IPL for two years. This was a massive blow to the teams and its fans and the league in general.
It is a known fact that CSK did not get banned due to match-fixing, which some fans had argued. Rather, they were penalized for the corrupt practices of its official, Meiyappan.

This ban was a wake-up call for the IPL and Indian cricket. It brought home the need for stricter regulations and greater transparency so that such an incident would never happen again in the future.

At last, the ban was lifted and CSK rejoined the IPL in 2018. Yet, the case had a strong impact on the league and left a reminder to everyone about how important fair play and integrity were in sports.