The Indian cricket board, which had tried to find a financial solution to keep the debt-ridden IPL franchise alive, decided in an emergency governing council meeting to terminate the Deccan Chargers team.
Sources said the board will float a tender for a new IPL team that could be based out of Hyderabad. Sources said the Deccan Chargers had committed a material breach of the IPL franchisee agreement by not paying its players salaries for more than four months now.
They said the Deccan Chargers Holdings Limited (DCHL) and private banks which had lent it money had shot themselves on the foot by not accepting PVP Ventures’ bid of Rs 900 crore in an auction to find a buyer for the franchise.
Yes Bank, one of the lenders, had offered a bailout package to pay players’ salaries for IPL V nearly a week ago – but the board had rejected the offer. Now, sources said that the banks continue to lobby hard to retain the cash-strapped team, but it would be of no use.
According to an internal note circulated to all working committee member on September 4, the board had chalked out three options — get actively involved in the sale of the franchisee as requested by the Chargers, conduct an auction for a new franchisee or go ahead with just eight teams in the 2013 league.
Now that the first option has been explored without success and the eight-team solution is not attractive, the board has opted to terminate the Chargers contract and float a new franchisee. The new buyer would have to take in the Chargers players and settle the outstanding 2012 fees. In that case, the board would decide on a reserve price and the number of years over which the franchisee fee would be payable. “BCCI could choose to invite bids for other cities,” the note said.
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