The following is the list of grievances raised by Sahara before the Board of Control for Cricket in India:
BCCI had committed for a joint statement on Feb 13/14 but they completely flouted it by breaking the news on the 12th itself. Hence, it became imperative for us to clarify the requests that we had made to BCCI.
The following issues were the subject of discussion:
· The issue of players’ was discussed to ensure a level playing field. For that, the need for an open Auction to be held in 2013 was also put forward. Till then, we should be allowed one extra overseas player in the playing eleven as since there is no Indian player who can match up to Yuvraj Singh.
Subrata Roy also put across very firmly that if all teams are balanced, the tournament and all the matches will be very competitive and that viewers will enjoy the competition else the tournament will lose its charm. This is the precise reason why Sahara had insisted on an open auction last year after the induction of two new teams.
· Roy said considering the reduced number of matches that took place against the earlier proposed by BCCI, we have ended up bidding 27 percent extra if we go by the revenues we would have accrued from media rights, gate receipts, sponsorship revenue etc. There has to be a reduction in the franchise fee as per the above.
· The possibility of Sahara seeking strategic partners for its franchise.
· None of the eight teams who entered IPL in 2008, deposit any bank guarantee against franchise fee. At present, Sahara is required to deposit the bank guarantee against the franchise fee. Considering that Sahara has never defaulted payment any of the payments to BCCI in last 12 years, this is out and out discriminatory in nature.
· Announcement of Sahara towards the Sports and Social Development programs.
· If issues related to IPL are solved, then we could also discuss the sponsorship of the Indian cricket Team though it was put forward that we have to balance our announced Sports and Social Development programs by partly diverting finances committed from cricket into social work.
On the subject of the sponsoring the Indian Cricket Team, the right to assign the sponsorship to other corporates was vested with Sahara.
In the last 3-4 days, Subrata Roy himself, and his team discussed the option of assigning full or partial sponsorship with some corporates. It was done because Sahara has committed to team sponsorship for 2-4 months till a new sponsor is on board, hence there was a need to finalise at the earliest.
Though they were interested in the opportunity, we were very surprised to know that they were not willing to pay more than 50-60 percent of the current value.
