Open Letter to FM: DISBAND IPL, OVERHAUL BCCI & Ministry of Sports

With IPL muck out in the open it’s time to clean up the entire Sports Administration setup and rid it of corruption, nepotism, inertia, mercenary attitude and other evils. Let’s appoint a 3-member committee of retired Supreme Court Justices to investigate and make recommendations.

BCCI can be an autonomous body within the Ministry of Sport with each State Cricket Association chief as ex-officio member of the general body. The Governing Council of 7 members, including Chairman and 6 specialist portfolio members, be made mainly of former Cricketers alone, those who have played the game, and know about it.

BCCI should no longer be a Not-for-Profit organisation, and the same time profit should not be the only motive. The profits generated should be utilised for promoting the game, and encourage other sports.

The Ministry to have one Cabinet-rank Minister, with 2 ministers of state one for Cricket and one for all other sports.

IPL, a monster as it has turned out needs to go. It’s true that the IPL, as a model, has been an ingenious & revolutionary brand. The existing forms of cricket need to be overhauled completely and modernised on IPL lines.

There are Test Matches, One-Day Internationals, T20 official games, besides there is a host of domestic tournaments. There is absolutely no need to have a separate league-like monster of IPL, which tends to commercialise the sport, and along with which brings other nefarious elements like money-laundering, match-fixing, betting, sleaze, all night partying challenging the Indian value system.

No denying that the IPL has been lauded as a great success, in creating a new economic paradigm based on some western commercial sporting models, but it would be worthwhile to reflect, “at what cost?” Does this give us any identity of our own?
British legacy it may be, Cricket has become a national obsession, and has almost a religious-cult like following. Then why not have it our Indian way? We can borrow all the best enterprising ideas from IPL model, and employ the same in our existing structure, drastically overhaul the entire body of sports.

Instead of creating commercial IPL leagues, why not modernise and create a brand-value out of each of the State Cricket Associations, re-christen them and create a new image? To begin with, let’s hire independent consultants to do this.

Limited-Over 2-Day Test Matches:
As the game itself has evolved over decades, and given us Limited-Overs matches, T20 format, why not have 2-Day Test Matches with Limited-Overs format. Have two innings of 50-overs each, and there will be a certain result at the end of 2 days or 2 nights.

The total teams involved could be on following lines:
1. India B Team
2. Central Zone Brand (All from Central India)
3. East Zone Brand (All-except Kolkata)
4. North Zone Brand (all-except Delhi from the rest of North India)
5. South Zone Brand (All-except Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad from Southern India)
6. West Zone Brand (All-except Mumbai from Western India)
7. Bengaluru
8. Chennai
9. Delhi
10. Hyderabad
11. Kolkata
12. Mumbai

All above 12 Teams will have 20 Players each, and all except India B Team may have up to 4 foreign players with no more than 2 in Playing 11.
More teams may be added based on sizeable population following the sport in large numbers. In view of the volume of cricket, it is time to reign in some control and limit excessive cricket tournaments.

Each Regional & Local Governing Council should comprise of 7 members with various Technical Committees of 5 members.

Domestic Tournament:
Limited Overs Test Matches and T20 (a-La-IPL) can be arranged. Instead of all these Franchises the 12 teams enlisted above should be playing out. Format be modernised, and entertainment be Indianised with our own music & dance dhamakas interlaced.
The players, sponsors & all technical people be rewarded well. All revenue generated by TV Broadcasting rights & other brand options must come to BCCI Treasury, and shared with all 12 teams. Rights can’t be awarded for more than 4 years at a time (and not for 10 years period with obvious kickbacks involved)

Revenue Sharing Model:
50% to be allocated equally with all participating Nations / Teams (in case of Domestic Tournament), and the balance 50% in the proportion of points / standing. This will eliminate some of the problems associated with match-fixing.

All revenue sharing with Cricketers, Selection Committee members, Technical Committee professionals, etc. should be based on 40% minimum, and the remaining 60% on performance-based formula (To be evolved by a technical committee). No rewarding of non-performance.

Lastly, all current playing cricketers should be bound by contracts, renewed every year.

The BCCI revenue after Tax should be allocated as under:
40% for reserves (to be utilised for Sports Infrastructure - building new stadiums, academies, etc – promotion of Cricket specifically), 40% to be distributed as bonus to all those directly involved in generating this revenue (cricketers, coaches, ground-staffs) and the balance 20% to be contributed to Sports Ministry for the promotion of other sports Hockey, Football & Tennis.

The highlighted distribution of 40% bonus would be, going by the current IPL revenues, in millions, and of such a scale that any additional activities like endorsement business & column-writing may become unnecessary.

IPL Franchise:
Given all the financial irregularities, lack of transparency, money-laundering, and the BCCI’s own failure in oversight of this monster, and violation of its non-profit status, the IPL needs to be disbanded, freeze all the money and assets, and only after thorough investigation of clearance of all dues & all approvals from RBI, DRI and all other agencies, legitimate deposits of all the franchisees may then be returned.

Sports & the game of Cricket must be viewed as non-commercial faculties of human development, and as such the national pride, teams, cricketers can’t be object of auction. Auction in good old days was one way of liquidating & salvaging debts from bankrupt people. Let auction models be used for cattle in some overly-capitalist western societies. Our Teams & Cricketers can’t be franchised out like burgers & junk food.

Only way is to disband the IPL. The legitimate interests of genuine franchisee may be taken care of by giving them option to retain sponsorship titles rather than ownership, and a Sponsorship Fee of $100 million may be retained in return for a reasonable return on their investment, which can be determined by the Finance Ministry not exceeding 20% plus a slight slice of the bonus pie to enable the market-economy to play out positively.

Let India show the way to the world in becoming a Unifying nation through sports.
Let Meritocracy & Excellence reign supreme.

Let’s all stakeholders earn the honour of calling IPL as INDIAN PRIDE LEAGUE.

IPL - Match has begun - Let's Fix it

Coin has been tossed, probably this one has tails on both sides. Let there be a thorough investigation into the entire episode, and bare all. Let's also learn a little and educate ourselves in treating any sport just as that, cricket being no exception. True, there can be no denying the passion Cricket generates, and also the indulgence of all involved in betting. Let's legalise betting, which will not only generate revenue, but also help stop the menace of match-fixing. Both betting & match-fixing go hand-in-hand.

This also has thrown up lot of questions about Transparency in the corporate world, IPL, even though a private enterprise, with billions invovled, can be no exception. Let's clean it up, clearly establish the ownership of all the franchisees, and get full accountability of stakes & revenues involved.

Let the Finance Ministry, Commerce Ministry and all concernced authorities also look into various laws relating to all the aspects of various kinds of corporate entities, audit all tax haven entities, and other agencies monitor the movement of big money.

Also hope that the various regional sports bodies involved, particularly state cricket associations, review all the structural & constitutional issues so that no one individual, regardless of character, is allowed to grow bigger than the entity.

It would augur well for all stakeholders involved to do some introspection and take a long-term view of evolving trends in events like IPL, and see if the magnum opus is killing the spirit of the game.