Political clout building in ICL's favour

Subhash Chandra's dream of launching a rebel cricket league, thwarted thus far every step of the way by the Board of Control for Cricket in India, has taken some crucial steps closer to becoming reality. Politicians from three different parties have now thrown their support behind the initiative.

The first and biggest political boost to the India Cricket League's proposed Twenty20 competition came after Union railway minister and Bihar Cricket Association chief Laloo Prasad Yadav voiced his support and also offered to make 30 stadia belonging to the Indian Railways available for matches.


Yadav's backing has completely changed the equation for the ICL, which till now had only one big name player to boast of in West Indian great Brian Lara and no stadia. This was because the Indian board had threatened life bans on any player associating with the ICL and also banned the rebel league from using any Indian grounds to conduct matches.

The support of Yadav, who is also the chief the RJD - a key party in the ruling UPA coalition alliance - and a possible successor to BCCI president Sharad Pawar, could well force the board to soften its stance against players signing up for the league.


"This is a good thing. There will be good competition. Many talented players will get encouragement. Those people who think they have not been recognised, or those who complain about not being selected will get a chance," said Yadav. "If there is competition between Subhash Chandra and Pawar, it's a good thing. We will get quality players," he added.

Yadav's comments were followed soon after by Congress party general secretary Digvijay Singh shooting off a letter to the BCCI asking the board to give up its confrontationist attitude.

In response, Pawar defended the board's stand saying the ICL tournament was an "out and out commercial venture" while "the board's earnings were spent on financing cricketing activities of various state associations and in augmenting infrastructural facilities."

The opposition BJP has also weighed into the matter, stating that the venture which would "help in breaking the BCCI's monopoly".

"The monopoly of BCCI is not in the interest of Indian cricket. With the coming of ICL, the bureaucratic attitude as well as the monopoly of the BCCI will break," BJP vice president Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi told newswire PTI.

"They (BCCI) always pose like a government body whose decisions are constitutionally binding. Nowhere in the world any association monopolises a game," PTI quotes Naqvi as saying.

Source-http://www.indiantelevision.com/headlines/y2k7/aug/aug151.php

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