BCCI doles out $5m to last year's IPL finalists

Tuesday, August 18, 2009 -- The BCCI has sprung a surprise on everyone by announcing a bailout of $5 million for both the IPL teams which had qualified for the Champions League in the first edition in 2008, but which was then cancelled due to the terrorists attacks in the city of Mumbai. The two teams that had qualified were the Rajasthan Royals and Chennai Super Kings, the winners and the runners-up of the first edition of the Indian Premier League.

The IPL rule-book clearly states that there will be no compensation paid to any team in case of a cancellation, but if individual boards wanted to assist the teams, they could do so.

It is known that Chennai Super Kings is owned by India Cements headed by N. Srinivasan, the secretary of BCCI. Srinivasan is also a member of the IPL and Champions League governing councils. Rajasthan Royals is co-owned by Emerging Media, a UK-based consortium, and the Chellarams.

The cancellation had cost the teams $500,000 each and a share of the prize money, but it wasn’t supposed to be as high as the current bail-out.

There have been mixed views about the bail-out with one party claiming that this would create a bad precedent, while another citing that it was well within the rules to do so!

An IPL official said, “The IPL's duty and obligation is towards its franchises and a fruitful, long-term relationship. The IPL's promise to the franchises was that if you qualify for the Champions League, you will play. But due to unfortunate circumstances, that didn't happen last year and we had to honour that commitment in the best manner possible”