On Monday, the Indian Premier League (IPL) Governing Council chairman, Brijesh Patel went on to confirm that the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) has received formal approval from the central government to conduct IPL 2020 in the UAE. The IPL 2020 will be taking place between September 19 and November 10 in three cities of UAE — Sharjah, Abu Dhabi, and Dubai.
The government had last week given an “in principle” go-ahead to the BCCI to shift the cash0rich league marquee league to the UAE due to increasing cases of COVID-19 in India. When asked whether the permission has given in writing from both the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) and the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA), as per the quotes in PTI, Patel confirmed, “Yes, we have received all the written approvals.”
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When an Indian sports body has teh willingness to shift a domestic tournament abroad, it requires clearance from Home, External, and sports ministries respectively.
Explaining the same to the PTI, a senior BCCI official said, “Once we had the verbal okay from the government, we had intimated the Emirates Cricket Board. Now we have the papers also, so franchisees can be intimated that everything is in order.”
Most of the franchises are expected to leave India by August 20 after two mandatory RT-PCR (COVID-19 tests) conducted within 24 hours from their departure base. The Chennai Super Kings (CSK) players and staff, who are scheduled to be leaving on August 22, will have a small camp at the Chepauk as it has been invited by the skipper, MS Dhoni.
On the other hand, the BCCI officials are having sleepless nights as their title sponsor Chinese mobile phone company Vivo has pulled off for the current year due to massive public outrage over the Sino-India border stand-off.
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It was a ₹440 crores per year deal and as BCCI has opened bids for the potential sponsors, Baba Ramdev’s Patanjali has shown interest in becoming the new title sponsor.
