World's richest BCCI hit by austerity virus

Mumbai: Known to be the richest board in the world, The BCCI has decided to halve the prize money for this year's IPL champions and the runners-up as part of its cost-cutting measures for the upcoming edition. In a circular sent to all IPL franchises, the BCCI has notified that instead of a whopping Rs 20 crore, the IPL champion team will now receive Rs 10 crore.

The glitzy events gets underway on March 29. "The financial rewards have been reworked as a part of the cost cutting measures. The champions will get Rs 10 crore instead of Rs 20 crore. The runners-up will get Rs 6.25 crore from earlier Rs 12.5 crore," a BCCI notification, in possession of PTI, read. The two losing qualifiers will now get Rs 4.3 crore each.

"The franchises are all in good health. They also have multiple ways like sponsorships to bolster their income. Hence the decision on prize money taken," a senior BCCI source said. However, state associations hosting IPL games will get Rs 1 crore with franchises and BCCI contributing Rs 50 lakh each. It has also been learnt that mid-level BCCI employees won't be allowed to avail business class flights like earlier for flying to Asian countries (Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, UAE) where the fight time is less than eight hours. Considered the white elephant in the family, the T20 league has been the biggest money spinner for the board since its inception in 2008.

Speaking to IANS, a BCCI official said that the financial restructuring that was done under the Committee of Administrators is one of the major reasons why the board has now been forced to relook the finances and take tough calls.

"This is an outcome of the COA''s handling of the BCCI where the BCCI money was being spent indiscriminately without a care in the world about the processes, only to look good in the eyes of certain sections of the public. The CFO seemed to be working in the best interest of the Tax Department rather than in the interest of the BCCI, the organisation he was supposed to act on behalf of.

"Why else would they need to get a protection order from the Hon''ble Court preventing them BCCI from going into their decisions? This is a direct result of that so the present dispensation cannot be blamed at all for this," the official explained.

In fact, it is believed that BCCI President Sourav Ganguly and team''s efforts to increase the fee of domestic players also hit a roadblock because of the heavy taxes that the board is having to pay due to certain ''financial'' failures on the part of the CoA.

When contacted an official of one of the IPL-winning franchises said that it didn''t mean much to the franchise as they had anyway distributed the prize money among the players and support staff, but franchises do have the right to check on it with the board.

"See, the amount isn''t a concern for us as we have in the past handed the full sum of money to the players and support staff. Maybe some of the other franchises might bring this up in the next round of meetings with the IPL Governing Council," the official told

Franchisees unhappy

The eight IPL franchisees, who are unhappy with the BCCI's decision to halve the prize money corpus to Rs 25 crore, will soon meet to decide the course of action over the board's "unexpected" move.

The IPL 2020 begins on March 29. "We are unhappy that the play-off standing fund has been halved. We were not even consulted. The franchisees have been discussing it informally and will soon have a formal meeting to discuss the issue," an official from a South-based franchise told PTI. "It is a big hit. We are discussing it internally as well as with other teams. All the teams are meeting soon to discuss it," said an official from another franchise. Defending champions Mumbai Indians host Chennai Super Kings in the IPL opener at Wankhede Stadium on March 29.