Mascarenhas's car rammed head-on into another car and overturned when he was returning from church in Nagpur, western India. He died of head injuries.

Tendulkar, the Indian number one batsman, was not involved in the accident. He was in the north Indian city of Kanpur for Monday's fourth one-day international against England.

Mascarenhas headed the Connecticut-based sports management company WorldTel, which used Tendulkar as cricket's best selling brand after signing a multimillion dollar deal with the Bombay strokeplayer last year.

World Cup deal

WorldTel refrained from putting a figure on the five-year contract's worth, but industry sources said it was valued at approximately 800 million rupees, well in excess of GBP10 million.

Mascarenhas first emerged on the international cricket scene by winning the worldwide TV rights for the 1996 World Cup - jointly hosted by India, Pakistan and Sri Lanka.

Having outbid several more established firms to clinch that deal, Mascarenhas was the first to sell television to several countries that had never previously broadcast live cricket.

His entrepreneurial zeal soon saw him rival the success of Australian Kerry Packer, the first businessman to get rich on cricket's appeal to global television audiences.

However, WorldTel had recently been under investigation by India's Central Bureau of Investigation.

Prime property

It was claimed that Mascarenhas's firm had colluded with officials of India's state-owned TV network, Doordarshan, and the International Cricket Council to drive up the telecast fees of the Mini World Cup in Dhaka, Bangladesh.

WorldTel's deal with Tendulkar last year reaffirmed the star player's status as cricket's prime property, several notches above all other cricketers past and present.

Among Mascarenhas' plans for Tendulkar was a global chain of restaurants carrying his name.

Tendulkar's previous five-year contract with Mascarenhas' company was for six million dollars - which became a new benchmark for cricket in 1996.

Rated as the best batsman in contemporary cricket, Tendulkar, 28, is one of the most recognized faces in cricket-mad India and has endorsed products including soft drinks, health food, sportswear and credit cards.