By IANS
Kolkata : Responding to Indian Premier League chairman Lalit Modi’s threat that Eden Gardens would be scrapped as venue for the Twnety20 venture, Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB) president Prasun Mukherjee Saturday said differences over ticket sales will be ironed out to allow the extravaganza roll out in the country’s sporting capital.
“The whole thing will be sorted out. No one wants the games to go out of Kolkata. There are eight centres and everyone hosts, our people will not lose out on the cricket extravaganza,” Mukherjee said, allaying fears that the cricket crazy people might miss out on the euphoria.
The CAB has called for a Working Committee meeting Monday and a Special General Meeting Feb 26 to resolve differences within the state body.
“And if at all there is a problem, the game will be shifted to one of the four reserve venues and the people who are creating problems now will be responsible for denying the people of Kolkata and Eastern India a superlative cricket tournament,” Mukherjee told IANS here Saturday.
“People cannot miss out the bigger picture which is welfare of cricket, giving the fans and spectators a chance to see their icons play. If there is a real big problem and Sourav Ganguly, who is getting ready to lead his side, has to go and play elsewhere, it will be a shame for CAB,” he said.
Modi has threatened the CAB of withdrawing the Kolkata team and playing them in Ahmedabad, one of the reserve venues, if it did not adhere to the rules and regulations of the League, set to commence in April.
In a tough statement, Modi said, “We cannot and will not allow one city to derail the whole process.”
Mukherjee had put forward queries regarding the complimentary distribution of tickets to clubs, members, honorary members, which irked Modi.
“There are three groups of people who are getting adversely affected, as far as distributions of tickets are concerned. Clubs, who as members were entitled to a certain quota of club house tickets, complimentary tickets and priced tickets (which they used to buy); the 31,000 associate members, honorary members and life members, who used to get complimentary tickets, as per Cab rules; and Companies, with whom CAB has contracts for boxes, have the impression that they are entitled to their boxes during all major matches at the Eden Gardens. They are not going to get their boxes.”
“They don’t understand that BCCI is not responsible for IPL. BCCI is just a facilitator and so are we, being members of the parent body. The companies who own the teams are responsible for the games and they are sharing 20% tickets against all categories with us. Besides they will give us Rs 10 crores and the money will obviously filter down to the member clubs” he said.
The four reserve centres are Kanpur, Ahmedabad, Cuttack and Gwalior.