Low salary and lavish lifestyle may have been the reasons behind the alleged involvement of three players from the Malaysian Indian Sports Council-Malaysian Indian Football Association (MISC-MIFA) to receive bribes for match fixing.

Youth and Sports Minister Khairy Jamaludin said his views were based on the feedback given by Health Minister Datuk Seri S. Subramaniam, who is also MIC president, that the party's football club neither had a huge allocation nor paying high salaries to its players.

"I assume that the club's players were influenced by the lavish lifestyle of other teams' players and looking at their high-paid salaries.

"I was also informed of the possibility that this case might have happened after the club has qualified to play in the Premier League this year and the players begin to get attention," he told a press conference after the launching ceremony of KL2017 Torch Relay here today.

The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission (MACC) detained three MISC-MIFA, including an import player, and a scrap metal shop worker who allegedly acted as the bookie. The trio were believed to have made thousands of ringgit in bribes.

All the suspects were being detained between six and seven days to facilitate investigations under Section 16(a)(A) of the MACC Act 2009.

Congratulating MACC for the arrest, Khairy said he is confident that both MIFA and the Football Association of Malaysia (FAM) would give full cooperation to MACC and the police over the case.

"Let this be a lesson to any player or team...I am confident that only legal action will overcome bribery or the bookie issue," he added.

-- BERNAMA