Kochi given green light by the BCCI

January 25, 2011

The uncertainly surrounding the Kochi IPL franchise as finally been ended after the BCCI gave the team the green light to take part in next years Indian Premier League.

The franchise which is owned by Rendezvous Sports World finally satisfied the notice issued by the BCCI at the start of November meaning the franchise will be allowed to take part in next months player auctions.

The green light was given to Kochi during an IPL governing council meeting in Mumbai on Sunday morning to end an extraordinary chapter in the history of the Indian Premier League which started in April when Rendezvous Sports surprisingly won the rights to one of two new IPL franchises.

The consortium paid $333 million for the right’s to place a new franchise in Kochi but having secured the team their nightmare started to begin after a public fall out with IPL commissioner Lalit Modi.

Modi, who was sacked by the BCCI in September, announced the details of the investors in the team via twitter after a war of words with Junior foreign minister Shashi Tharoor.

Tharoor, who resigned after the scandal claimed Modi was trying to discredit the team and create a reason to remove the franchise from Rendezvous Sports so it could be moved to another city.

The Junior foreign minister helped Rendezvous Sports during the bidding process and although Tharoor had no stake in the franchise he said the Kochi team had bid in an "open and transparent" manner.

"Their unexpected success upset the plans of a lot of powerful people, who had wanted the franchise to go elsewhere," said Tharoor.

"The unethical efforts that have been made by Mr Modi and others to thwart the Kerala franchise which has been won fair and square in a transparent bidding process are disgraceful," he added.

Since then Rendezvous Sports have been trying to resolve the ownership differences between the five groups of investors; who still haven’t agreed on who will have control of the franchise after successfully bidding $333 million at the IPL franchise in March.

The investors include finance companies Anchor Earth, Parinee Developers, Rosy Blue and Film Wave; who hold 75 per cent of the equity. The remaining 25 per cent of the franchise was given to the Gaekwads family as free equity for their help in successfully bidding for the franchise.