As the Indian Problem league – Oops! Indian Premier League is set to commence the much awaited edition 3, problems and controversies seem to be hitting them in plenty!

Action seems to have begun even before the auction began. With a planned move that owners called “strategy” and the media describes as “balderdash”, ignoring players from our “friendly” neighboring nation stoked a fire. “Dildo” fuelled that fire with a masterstroke to promote his new movie angering the Shiv Sena and setting tongues waging. I’m not here to pass a judgement on the right thing to do – As most passionate Indians, I don’t think that the current political climate would aid Pakistani players to come in and play, not to forget, earn some top dollar and take that back to Pakistan. That said, I also believe that sports shouldn’t be mixed with other issues. Sadly though, our structures don’t permit the co-existence of both ideologies. Someone said, there’s got to be only one dagger in a sheath!

If the auction bit was wave 1, our friends in the rash state of Maharashtra seem to have a new sense of hatred for the Aussies! They threatened to stop the Aussies from playing in Mumbai and had the big bosses calling them. It’s not an unknown fact that their muscle is with the hooligans. From a commercial perspective, the cricket bosses were worried and rightly so. As much as we hate the Aussies for their erstwhile dominance of cricket, we can’t live without them either.

A Shane Warne is a top draw wherever he goes as are the Gilly’s, Hayden’s and the McGrath’s! Cricketers like them are no longer produced and looking at one of the initial tenants of the IPL, the young Indians can learn a ton from some legends like these! The magic unfortunately didn’t work and the Sena seems to have snubbed the cricket bosses. The Government can put up a brave face and promise the support, but it’s a question of time before ruthless elements like these rear their head and cause trouble. If a Government that can’t protect our borders and act on intelligence save innocent citizens, what hopes do these so called security measures have on an unruly crowd?

If this was not enough, the Deccan Chargers have issued a notice to the IPL for moving out matches from Hyderabad. Telangana or otherwise, someone at least believes matches should be played in Hyderabad – there’s a sense of government support (please as need for money) as this battle unfolds! I don’t know if this was big news or not as I didn’t see this breaking. Poor young Jadeja has been banned and he seeks to appeal against it!  Being a recent feature on the international circuit, he’d hate it to be left out – forget the experience and all that blah blah!

With Mumbai being a potential issue and Hyderabad joining, what’s Lalit Modi going to do? Unfortunately for him, he has very little time on his hands to pull off a South African safari. There’s too much skin in the game to even consider moving the IPL beyond our shores and I watch with baited breath. Being that South Indian Tam Bram, isn’t it time we renamed the IPL??

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From being popularly known as the Indian Premier League to quickly becoming the Indian Problem League, the fall for the IPL has been rapid.

The money is something that cricket had not seen before. Money talks they say and so is it in this case!  From bringing in cricketers who the world thought was long gone back to stage, to helping another part of the world discover some amazing “young” talent, to entertaining all those cricket crazy fans every evening after work and last not least, giving kids around the country an extra reason to celebrate summer vacations, the IPL did it all in it’s inaugural edition. All good things come with controversies and IPL was not exception to this either. Accusing the league for pushing cricketers around the world into pre-mature retirement, choosing money over country and last but not least, not being inclusive, we saw it all.

I personally enjoyed season one. Choosing whom to support was an easy decision. Being a Bangalorean, I was disappointed to see a test team line up to play T20. My loyalty quickly swung to the best thing that’s happened to Indian cricket – MS Dhoni and his Chennai Super Kings. MSD played masterstroke with the team selection even before a ball was bowled. Getting a right mix of locals and expats, Dhoni ensured that he got along an uncut diamond, Raina along with him to stitch his team of the boys in yellow. The joker in the pack was of course the Rajasthan Royals. Acclaimed to have the greatest ever cricketing brain ever and blessed with exceptional skill to turn a cricket ball on glass, Shane Warne, up north, was putting together his team of underdogs. I wasn’t surprised to see these two teams do battle in the finals. I would have loved to see MSD and his boys win, but on a given day, the team that plays better cricket wins and right so, the Royals.

With time to kick start season 2 around the corner, the hype started as early as the New Year – the fallout of 26/11 meant that the Pakistani players didn’t want to come. For those that may argue this on who didn’t want who, the trading window and the money spent did its share to the share of ink. The nail in the coffin was the recent attack in neighboring Pakistan on a touring Sri Lankan team. While this was “outside” India, the event’s ripples traveled over 500 kms to the national capital for the administrators to sit up and take notice of potential security risks.

From an exchange of words to reading between lines, from the politics of power to the politics of money, in the name of democracy and elections, the home ministry showed who is the boss by having the IPL postpone it’s initial published schedule. Lalit Modi is a die hard and he went out saying this will happen with no change. Someone in the higher echelons of power asked him to backtrack and so he did, with a revised schedule – more cities and slightly different dates. This time around, the states came in to the party saying they were not staffed well enough to support security cover for these games and the proposed elections.

The issue of “security” in the sub-continent is being viewed at very differently by all the foreign players who were itching to come and get a game – life Vs money and we all know the obvious choice that these so called players from safe havens from around the world tend to make. With a couple of casualties in terms of big names dripping out for the fear of life, this storm is yet to blow over.

To me, the real issue on hand is the question of these two events co-existing. Elections are no doubt important and so too is the issue of security. A country of a billion people is suddenly faced with the issue of resources for security – what a paradox.

If I were Modi, I’d flex my financial muscle to hire SO many of those unemployed, semi skilled youth and train them to build up my own security forces for the IPL. Hiring or training is not an issue considering how much time is left. If you want to run and need shoes, you must go and get them! Waiting for someone to give them to you is not smart business. To me, this move is a great win win – strike a deal with the center to say that this newly built security force can be used as a potential resource to staff up national security services. Upskilling them to play a different game is easy and is doable if they clear hurdle one. Your cup of woes is filling up real quick Mr. Modi.. game to try?

Image Credit: Wikimedia

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