The
jersey which Indian Skipper, M.S. Dhoni donned while lifting the T20 World Cup,
50 Over World Cup, Asia Cup, VB Series and many more… will now only be seen in
video footage!
What
used to be a gentleman’s game is now managed by not so gentle individuals.
The
13 year old sponsor of Indian Cricket Team, Sahara has been denied sponsorship,
irrespective of the fact that it quoted the highest bid. The game which used to
be a religion is not turning into a dirty politics.
Over
the years, we have grown watching the Men In Blue with ‘Sahara’ written proudly
on their chest. If newspapers are to be believed, it’s the high ego of few
people in BCCI that resulted in the loss of Rs. 50 crore to one of the biggest
Cricket Board in the world. With BCCI awarding the sponsorship to Star at 1.92
crore per match for a period of 3 years, the Board is making a loss of Rs. 50
crore as against the bid price of Rs. 2.35 crore quoted by Sahara.
It’s
not about who gets the sponsorship. It’s majorly about the funds. Less funds
means less development of sport.
As per the newspapers, the Board never bothered to inform the current sponsor
that they’re ineligible till the very last moment. The Sahara Officials were
quoted in the newspapers saying that they were continuously in discussion with
the Board on various modalities pertaining to bidding, but BCCI preferred to
keep silent as they had other intentions.
The
reason of ineligibility for Sahara, as cited by BCCI, is that one of our
company, Sahara Adventure Sports Ltd., which held the Pune IPL franchisee, is
in dispute with the Board. Sahara had raised the issue regarding significant
reduction in the number of matches which was one of the most important basis
and criteria for the bid, since 2011. BCCI had made pre-bid representations
that 94 matches will be held in every season and then arbitrarily reduced the
number of matches from 94 to 74 & then 76. Sahara had placed its bid for
the IPL franchise based on the representations of BCCI which were false. The
reduction in the number of matches has had a substantial financial impact due
to the reduction in the central revenues under the Franchise Agreement.
The
fact is that even when this IPL dispute was on-going, Sahara had made regular
payments for the sponsorship of National India Cricket Team. In fact, it never
defaulted on the payments. During all this period, BCCI had been accepting all
the payments from Sahara India Financial Corporation Ltd. and their logo was
very much present on the Team jersey all the time and is even today and shall
remain till December end 2013.
While
flipping the newspapers, one can read that over the 13 years, Sahara has spent
Rs. 1,000 crore only on Cricket Sponsorship. This means that much of the BCCI’s
worth is formed from the support that Sahara has provided in so many years.
Still, no consideration given to India’s prime sports promoter – Bizarre!
On
the other hand, the Board still has a Chief who (already has and is keen) to
bring disgrace to the game. A stubborn, corrupted and shameless individual is
here to destroy the game, which is sliding down just because of one man’s ego.
Someone like Sahara who has spent so much on the development of the game that
is followed religiously in India and still quoted the highest bid, has been
denied sponsorship on grounds that will only make you realise that it’s
personal vengeance of one man who wants to rule and keep his ego high up in the
sky!
As
a die-hard lover of the game, one can only pray that the game is managed in the
true sportsmanship way, which is clear of all such issues that harm the
productivity of the game and the players who put-in their efforts to keep our
tricolor fly high!
Fingers crossed!
