IPL 2019 to go ahead without any Chairman or Governing Council: Reports

The confusion surrounding the next edition of the IPL just continues to die down. The reason behind the same is the next year’s World Cup as well as the general elections in the country. The IPL will start early next year with reports suggesting that it might get underway mid-March due to the ICC 50-over World Cup that begins in England on May 30.

The English and Australian cricket boards have already announced that their players will miss the fag end of the competition to prepare for the showpiece event in England. The onus is now on the BCCI to conclude the tournament as early as possible because of player availability.

But the road ahead is not smooth. The Indian cricket board is waiting on the schedule of the general elections in India to finalise a venue for the next edition. There are reports suggesting that the competition might move out of India again due to the elections. In 2009, the entire tournament was held in South Africa while in 2014, the early part was held in UAE.

South Africa looks like the most possible destination if the board decides to move the competition out of the country. Earlier this year,  a recce team of the BCCI had visited South Africa to inspect the venue.  However, reports also suggest that  Star India, the broadcaster that has shelled out in excess of INR 16000 crore for IPL rights, does not want the tournament shifted out of the country.   With so many obstacles ahead of them, the Indian board faces a herculean task in staging the next edition of the competition.

Ever since Lalit Modi was banned by the BCCI in 2010, the GC and the chairman of the committee had the final say on the matters related to the league. “Yes, the new chairman will be appointed only after elections are conducted and as of now, all IPL matters will be looked into by the CoA, IPL COO, CEO and the office-bearers,” a BCCI official told Hindustan Times.

“In all its years, this is the first time that the IPL is without a chairman or even a governing council. It is a dangerous situation to be in since the decision making is anything but democratic and even in the past it was such a scenario when decision making was centred in one man, a former IPL chairman, that the BCCI was rocked by financial scandals.

“The Lodha panel in its report had said that the idea of the report was to ensure that concentration of too much power in one man is avoided but that seems to be exactly what has been achieved,” he added.

Meanwhile, the auction for the next edition of the IPL was recently held in Jaipur. 346 players had gone under the hammer for the 70 available spots.

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