The BCCI decision of taking IPL to another country put the country on tenterhooks. No sooner the decision was made public in Mumbai, than the rumor mills across the country started working overtime, spinning out guesses that spanned from political ploy to BCCI’s own game of exerting pressure on the government. While BCCI president clearly was not in a mood to grinding his words to suppress his resentments, the franchisees came out to be more political in their choice of words.

 

Home Minister P Chidambaram Defines an Indian's Priority

 

At the press conference held at the Wankhede, the BCCI Chief did not hesitate blaming the central government and few state governments for forcing them to take the decision of shifting Indian Premier League abroad. “We tried our best to make sure that the IPL is held in India. However because of the attitude of the governments, particularly those of Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, we were forced to move the event out of India. We are in discussion with other boards who have shown willingness to hold the IPL in their respective countries,” president Shashank Manohar stated at the press conference.

“Unfortunately the Chief Minister of Maharashtra (Ashok Chavan) issued an order last evening saying that security cannot be provided until the Lok Sabha elections (due to be held in the state on April 30) … and the Andhra Pradesh government revoked its earlier permission to hold matches,” he added.

The controversial IPL Chief Lalit Modi however seemed to be reluctant to spark off fresh controversy and told in his statement that “I don’t blame anybody for anything.” However, he pointed out that moving the upcoming cricket tournament to another country would essentially entail commercial and logistic implications. He also hinted that while logistically, the offshore Indian Premier League is going to be very very challenging, it might not be very profitable in its second year. However, the IPL boss makes it clear that at this juncture, it is not important, whether or not it can make big money, the only important issue right now is: maintaining the continuity and bringing it before the television audience back home. He also rules out the possibility of holding the semis and final in India, as it would be very taxing on the players and logistically unmanageable.

While the BCCI blames it on governments at center and states, a group of former cricketers are of the opinion, that BCCI has “messed up” the entire issue and they include the brigade of such cricketers as Kapil Dev and Erapalli Prasanna. While country’s World Cup winning captain considers that BCCI would have consulted the cricketers before taking such a drastic decision, the legendary spinner of the yesteryear maintains, that BCCI has made a big mistake by not consulting the government well in advance of chalking out the tournament schedule. Dilip Vengsarkar, another veteran who led India in international cricket however, supports the BCCI stand.  “The important thing is the safety of the players. If the government has apprehensions about the safety of the players when polls are held it’s advisable to move it out”, says the former Indian skipper.

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3.25 Copyright (C) 2007 Alain Georgette / Copyright (C) 2006 Frantisek Hliva. All rights reserved."

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