The Indian skipper, Virat Kohli has finished a few crores behind the Bollywood actor Salman Khan in Forbes India’s Celebrity 100 List for 2018. The list has been made after measuring the earnings between October 1, 2017, and September 30, 2018, and Salman is leading the charts for the third consecutive year. While, Kohli accumulated ₹228.09 crore in earnings during the year – behind Salman’s ₹253.25 crore. IPL franchise Kolkata Knight Riders’ co-owner and Bollywood actor Shah Rukh Khan had finished second in 2017 as his earnings are estimated to be ₹53 crores this year and he is standing at the 13th position.
After finding the cumulative earnings of the top 100 the number comes out to be ₹3,140.25 crore, but that figure was 17 percent lower at ₹2,683 crore in 2017. The legendary Indian cricketer, Sachin Tendulkar continues to be part of the list despite retiring from cricket in 2013. He has been part of the top-10 of the list, which began in 2012, each year. His earnings stood at ₹80 crore this year as compared to the average of ₹73.12 crore over the past seven years.
Also in the top-10 of the rankings is former India skipper MS Dhoni whose earnings stood at ₹101.77 crore. He has already hanged his boots from Test cricket and based on his exclusion from the T20I series against West Indies and Australia, he seems to be out of favor in the format too. However, his brand value and following continues to be strong in south India on account of his captaincy of IPL franchise Chennai Super Kings (CSK).
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In 2018, the Indian skipper’s earnings more than doubled as he accumulated a whopping amount of ₹228.09 crores. It should also be noted that the BCCI central contract, Royal Challengers Bangalore salary isn’t among the major contributors to Kohli’s earnings, with the advertising contracts proving to be the real deal.
The list, among the sportspeople, is significantly led by cricketers with 14 of the 21 sports stars among the top-100. Besides Kohli, Dhoni and Sachin, other cricketers in the list are: Rohit Sharma (₹31.49 crore, 23rd), Hardik Pandya (₹28.46 crore, 27th), R Ashwin (₹18.9 crore, 44th), Bhuvneshwar Kumar (₹17.26 crore, 52nd), Suresh Raina (₹16.96 crore, 55th), KL Rahul (₹16.48 crore, 59th), Jasprit Bumrah (₹16.42 crore, 60th), Shikhar Dhawan (₹16.26 crore, 62nd), Ravindra Jadeja (₹15.39 crore, 68th), Manish Pandey (₹13.08 crore, 77th), Ajinkya Rahane (₹12.02 crore, 78th).
While Bumrah and Manish made it to the list for the first time in their career, Hardik Pandya was the biggest gainer as he earned just ₹3.04 crores last year, the all-rounder bagged ₹28.46 crores this term, hence taking a rise of more than 800 percent.
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Other athletes to feature in the list are shuttlers PV Sindhu (₹36.5 crore, 20th), Saina Nehwal (₹16.54 crore, 58th), Kidambi Srikanth (₹10.5 crore, 87th), golfers Anirban Lahiri (₹11.99 crore, 81st), Shubhankar Sharma (₹4.5 crore, 98th); boxer Vijender Singh (₹6.4 crore, 96th) and tennis player Rohan Bopanna (₹3.27 crore, 99th).
