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The IPL’s Sordid Saga

Apr 28, 2010 Editorial

As we kick off the ICC 20/20 World Cup, it might be of interest to review the sordid saga that is unfolding in the Indian Premier League (IPL).  Only a month ago, the IPL was seen as the very quintessence of what a modern sports organisation – especially in the outer regions like the West Indies – should become. The IPL was a dramatic reflection in the game of cricket of India’s rise out of poverty and into the heady realms of the global superstar nations. Long dominated by an Anglo-Australian combine, by the turn of the millennium cricket’s centre of gravity had inexorably shifted to the Indian subcontinent with its billion-and-a-half cricket-crazy masses.
As the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) began to flex its (financial) muscle, it dawned on some ambitious men that they were sitting on a veritable money-making machine. What other business could count on having the state build (out of the public purse) its physical infrastructure (stadiums), train its labour force (cricket in schools), offer it tax exemption on its revenues (no entertainment taxes) – and still not be classified as a business?
A palace coup was staged and the old supremo (Jagmohan Dalmiya) was replaced by a big-wig from the ruling Congress Party and now Agriculture Minister – Sharad Pawar. One of his key henchmen was his protégé, the young, ambitious and energetic Lalit Modi who spearheaded the corruption charges against Dalmiya in 2005-2006.
In 2007, Zee TV, locked out of the lucrative billion-dollar Indian broadcast market by BCCI since 2000 even though it had been the highest bidder (any guesses as to the reason?), decided to create its own cricket vehicle.  It launched the Indian Cricket League (ICL) with the new 20/20 format and the draw of top local and domestic names. It promised to work in parallel with the BCCI but the latter came down on it like a ton of bricks and used its clout within the ICC to ban players that signed onto the ICL. A year later, Lalit Modi launched the BCCI’s answer to the ICL – dubbed the IPL, the success of which was guaranteed when the ICC allowed international players to participate and created a window for the IPL to showcase its product.
The product was delivered with such razzmatazz and glitz by the workaholic but megalomaniac Modi that few bothered to look at what exactly had fuelled what the Guardian of London has described as “a social, sporting and commercial phenomenon, worth an estimated $4.13 billion in just three years.” The first and still largest anomaly was that the IPL was constituted simply as a unit of the BCCI and thus having not even a constitution. A supposedly “non-profit” body could therefore assess and decide on bids for franchises that were valued in the hundreds of million dollars for each – and would rake in billions from TV and other commercial rights – not to mention revenue from the gates.
It was and remains a recipe for nepotism, crony-capitalism, related party transactions, governmental corruption, asset valuations more nebulous than the derivatives that brought down the developed world economies, money-laundering through Mauritius, game-fixing and all the other ailments that had long typified business-dealings in India. The lid was only blown when one Minister of government (Shashi Tharoor) dared accusing Modi of arm-twisting in the latest bidding for two new franchises. Modi, the street-fighter, revealed that Tharoor had a conflict of interest in one franchise. This led not only to the resignation of Tharoor but the central government’s investigation into the finances of the ICL and its franchises.
Revelations are flowing fast and furious even as the BCCI has turned on its wrath on its erstwhile fair-haired hatchetman, Modi, whom they have suspended and accused of a host of malfeasances – initial bids of Rajasthan Royals (where Modi’s relatives are now revealed to have large interests) and Kings XI Punjab, the broadcasting deal, bid rigging in 2010, internet rights and his “behavioral patterns”. Modi, in his inimitable style, is not taking all this lying down – and might very well take the whole edifice he so aggressively built, down with him. Is there a lesson here for imposing stricter controls over our cricket administrations?

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