Welcome to Indian Political League

Politics and BCCI have never been far away. To move Jagmohan Dalmiya out, it required a man of Sharad Pawar’s political stature. Lalit Modi’s nexus with ex-Rajasthan chief minister is too well known. And a lot of the state cricket associations’ office bearers are affiliated to various political parties as well. So any talk of seperating cricket from politics in India is living in denial of reality.

After weeks of ping ponging with the government, the BCCI has finally acted decisive or is it a blackmail? Despite preparing nearly 50 possible schedules as alternatives to factor in almost all possible scenarios, IPL officials could not get the government to give a clear go ahead for the second edition of IPL.

Along the way Maharashtra government announced their support to hold IPL in Mumbai with modified schedule and withdrew soon, Rahul Gandhi expressed his interest to utilize IPL slots for election campaign advertising until Lalit Modi said no to any political advertising in IPL and Lalit Modi lost a none too irrelevant election in Rajasthan Cricket Association. No wonder that IPL venue for Rajasthan Royals was shifted even before election security issues cropped up.

So what’s the real issue here? The rhetoric of “which is more important to the country – Elections or IPL?” hardly makes sense. Does the EPL stop when there are elections in England? No, so why should it be a problem here. But that’s because EPL doesn’t ask for paramilitary forces from the government to be able to conduct its tournament. So once the IPL has asked for it (sad after effects of Mumbai attack and more importantly the recent attack on Srilankan cricketers in Pakistan), they have no choice but to work around the government’s constraints (however real or unreal they maybe).

It all looks fine so far. So isn’t taking IPL offshore the most sensible solution albeit all the compromises involved. But its fine only if there is nothing more to it than what meets the eye. But that’s hardly a convincing hypothesis. Surely there seems to be political power play at work. BCCI was either too ignorant or too arrogant to not figure out that the Pakistani attack had huge ramifications on IPL and that coupled with the announcement of election schedule should have ensured they were working with the government from the early stages to sort out the security arrangements. But they were busy assuring the media that India is a safe country and it’ll go ahead as per schedule and presumed its their birthright to ask for paramilitary forces for security support.

The government on its part never displayed any conviction on the issue. One day Mr.Chidambaram articulates that elections and security is more important than IPL and hence there’s no other choice but to postpone it. Another day he says that everything will be done to ensure IPL happens in India closer to the original schedule. And state governments haven’t been any different. Already there’s a conspiracy theory floating around - that in Recessionary times, corporates who generally contribute to political campaigns will be pulling the plug and add that to the fact some of the big corporates of the country own IPL franchises for which they have to shell out huge sums. Is this conflict of interest which is the cause of all this political play is anybody’s speculation…

The irony is even without any political overtones the decision to conduct IPL in offshore venue in the given circumstances may just be the most sensible one! And any argument about Indian public being denied the pleasure of supporting their favorite team in the stadiums is redundant. Supporting your favourite team on television is still a better choice than not having a chance to support your team at all. And any argument against holding a domestic tournament in offshore location is absurd to say the least. IPL is a domestic tournament only for technical definition, its impact is far beyond, and it’s simply the best cricket tournament in the world involving the galaxy of best cricketers in the world.

Not many people believed that IPL would turn out to be such a smashing success in the first edition especially given the fact that it was organized in such a short span of time. So for all the drama and constraints surrounding the second edition, IPL might just be able to surprise all of us by putting on a grand show again wherever it is held. And the critical component for that is the quality of cricket on display. Thankfully that can’t be influenced by political power play!