The IPL has terminated its franchise agreements with Kings XI Punjab and Rajasthan Royals and has also issued a notice to the Kochi consortium, asking it to resolve disputes between the owners and form a joint venture company to hold the rights within ten days. The decisions were taken at an emergency meeting of the league's governing council in Mumbai on Sunday.
The decision to terminate the agreements was taken five days before the deadline given to the franchises to reply to the show cause notices issued on October 1. In the notices, both the franchises were accused of transgressions in relations to shareholding and ownership issues that would "shake the very foundation of the tender process."
One of the co-owners of the Rajasthan franchise, Raj Kundra, responded to the development by saying that they would explore legal options. "We have no idea [why the agreement was terminated]," Kundra told NDTV. "We need to see a copy of the termination notice and study it. I don't see IPL 4 happening if the BCCI treats other teams
like this."The BCCI president Shashank Manohar said after Sunday's meeting that Rajasthan and Punjab needed to be scrapped for "violation of the franchise agreement" and that there was no process to replace the two franchises at the moment. "With regards to Rajasthan, the bid was given by a different bidder and the agreement was entered into with a different company," Manohar said. "The shareholding pattern were different. The shares were transferred into with different people without the permission of the governing council."When asked about Kochi, Manohar said the franchise hadn't been scrapped because it hadn't violated the agreement, but was only suffering from internal disputes. He said Kochi had ten days to resolve all problems otherwise it also ran the risk of being scrapped.
"It was unanimously decided that the franchise agreements with KPH Dream Cricket Private Limited (Punjab) and Jaipur IPL Cricket Private Limited (Rajasthan) be terminated forthwith based on the legal opinions obtained by BCCI in the matters," the IPL's governing council said in a release after the meeting.
"It was further unanimously decided to issue a notice to the unincorporated joint venture holding the Kochi franchise, calling upon them to resolve all their disputes and form a joint venture company which will hold the IPL franchise rights."
Manohar had criticised the three franchises after the board's annual general meeting and was especially hard on Kochi. It was difficult, he had said, to communicate with Kochi as the franchise owners had split into two factions after winning the bid to become the tenth IPL franchise at the auction in March.
Sunday's meeting was the first for the reconstituted governing council, which had its membership reduced from 14 to eight, and its tenure and powers cut. Chirayu Amin was appointed the chairman of body, replacing ousted chairman Lalit Modi, and the rest of the council comprises five other members - Arun Jaitley, Ranjib Biswal, Anurag Thakur, Ajay Shirke and Rajiv Shukla - and two former cricketers, Ravi Shastri and Mohinder Amarnath, as honorary members.
Comments
Post a Comment