The bidding for the Indian Premier League's two new franchises turned out to be a damp squib as board members on the IPL Governing Council objected to the stiff norms in the tender documents.
Sources said that the board had issues relating to the tenders in the council meeting, on Sunday morning which led to the scrapping of the existing tender. They added that the board was unaware of all this till some corporate houses and individuals expressed their disappointment with the “tough clauses”. For instance, bidders needed to have a networth of $1 billion and submit a bank guarantee of $100 million.
It is believed that the Sahara Group, an interested bidder, had written to the board on these stringent clauses.
The company had indicated that this was unfair especially when they had a long association with the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) and were also official sponsors for the Indian cricket team. The Sahara group also added that when the first tendering process was initialised two years ago, the existing franchisees did not have to go through such tough norms. Two BCCI officials confirmed this development.
BCCI officials said that only three bids had been received from the Videocon and Adani groups as well as Jaiprakash Associates. “The bids are being returned without being opened. New tenders will be issued on March 9 and the fresh bids have to be submitted on March 21at 10 a.m. in Chennai which will be opened at 11 a.m.,” Mr Modi said at a press meet here on Sunday.
The new tenders will do away with the $1 billion networth clause and reduce the advance bank guarantee of $100 million. “The governing council has decided to bring this down to $10 million performance guarantee,” he said. In the first tender in 2008, it was $5 million.
Mr Modi also said the winnings bids will be expected to pay $10 million guarantee before the tender documents are opened, and then pay 10 per cent of their bid within 48 hours in the event of a successful bid.
Mr Venugopal Dhoot, Managing Director, Videocon said that though he was disappointed, he had no “grievances” as his consortium had fulfilled all conditions in the tendering process.
“I will be there on March 21 for submitting a new bid,” he said. Mr Dhoot will pitch in for Pune along with his brand ambassadors, Saif Ali Khan and Kareena Kapoor. The cities in the race are Indore, Pune, Ahmedabad, Dharamsala, Nagpur, Kanpur, Cuttack, Vizag, Rajkot, Kochi, Vadodara and Gwalior.
No comments:
Post a Comment