Modi to appeal against court order favouring Cairns

Wellington, April 3 (IANS) Former Indian Premier League (IPL) chairman Lalit Modi will be appealing against the High Court of London's verdict in the libel case filed against him by ex-New Zealand captain Chris Cairns, an aide said.

Modi's PR man, Phil Mepham told the Fairfax Media that the IPL founder would lodge an appeal before the April 20 deadline.

"The appeal is in the process of being lodged and will be done before the April 20 deadline. There is no advantage or disadvantage to it being lodged either sooner or later, so will be submitted once the technical details behind the appeal have been agreed," said Mepham, who was head of media for England's recent Fifa World Cup bid.

Modi last week had also hinted that he would appeal against the decision.

"I have seen the judgment. All I want to say at the moment is that we are appealing the judgment," he said on Twitter last week.

The High Court awarded Cairns 90,000 pounds in damages after a two-week trial last month.

Cairns had sued the Indian business over a Tweet made Jan 5, 2010. Modi had tweeted that the New Zealander was removed from the IPL auction list because of his involvement in alleged match-fixing in Indian Cricket League (ICL) in 2008.