Corruption adds extra spice to the IPL
Gethin Chamberlain in Navi Mumbai
The Observer
Sunday 25 April 2010
At 11.20pm last Thursday on a hot night in the DY Patil cricket stadium, all hell was breaking loose. The Deccan Chargers' last batsman had just swept the ball straight into the hands of the Chennai Super Kings' deadliest bowler and the ground erupted.
As the cacophony of sound cranked up another notch, fireworks exploded in the sky above the stadium, across the waters of Thane Creek from Mumbai. The international cricketing superstars hired to represent what used to be Madras were heading for the final of the Indian Premier League and the chance to call themselves champions of what is rapidly becoming the world's most controversial league.
Just another high-octane night in the IPL, now among India's most glamorous, intense spectacles, and a brand worth an estimated £2.7bn.
For Indians the IPL is the Champions League, FA Cup and Premier League title race rolled into one, uniting and dividing hundreds of millions of fans gathered wherever a television can be found, from the depths of the jungles to the highest mountain passes.
But it is becoming increasingly obvious that there is a dark underside to the glamour. Ever more popular, the IPL has fallen prey to the whims of politicians and the vast corporations benefiting from India's rapid transformation into an economic superpower: the plaything of a world riddled with financial skulduggery, allegations of match-fixing and rigged betting, and a unhealthy dose of political revenge.
Even as the last four teams slugged it out over the past week, the IPL threatened to implode after a spectacular row over the bidding for two new franchises cost one of the country's brightest politicians, Shashi Tharoor, his job and then engulfed its own boss, Lalit Modi.
Tharoor, junior foreign minister, an MP for a Kerala constituency and a cricket fan, had been brought in to advise a consortium bidding for one of two new franchises for next season. The London-born former UN diplomat had already racked up an impressive string of gaffes, largely through his fondness for the social networking site Twitter ("Flying cattle class out of solidarity with all our holy cows!" is a typical offering). His western style has made him enemies. And when his consortium secured a 10-year franchise for £216m and deprived some very rich people of the chance of becoming much richer, he became a marked man.
It was Modi, the public face of the IPL, who set the pack on Tharoor. It seems that Modi wanted the franchise to go to another bidder. He started to tweet, naming members of the winning consortium. Among them was Sunanda Pushkar, a Dubai-based businesswoman and reportedly Tharoor's girlfriend, who appeared to have been gifted a £10m stake. However much Tharoor denied it, it looked like a pay-off for securing the deal. He was forced to quit the government.
Modi barely had a moment to savour his victory before he was caught in the backlash. No one reaches ministerial level in India without having powerful friends. With opposition parties claiming the IPL was merely a front for money-laundering and illegal betting, Modi suddenly found the tax authorities breathing down his own neck. They let it be known that they were interested in how a man with a history of failed ventures could suddenly fund a private jet, a yacht and a fleet of Mercedes and BMW cars.
Modi's offices were raided and rumours started to circulate about a cocaine possession charge from his student days, and a South African model. Tomorrow – when the IPL's owner, the Board of Control for Cricket in India, meets to tackle the crisis – he faces the axe, although he has denied all allegations.
