Boria Majumdar, London
It was long planned. Lalit Modi had graciously invited the entire RevSportz team to his house for tea and agreed to a roundtable with us. As decided, we reached sharp at 2 pm and Lalit was waiting, looking relaxed in the inner patio of his lavish 2 Belgrave Square mansion.
“What do you want to drink,” he asked, as all of us settled down, on what was a very warm London afternoon. As some real nice and chilled lemonade got served, we got down to business. From the stampede during this year’s IPL-winning celebrations in Bengaluru, how the BCCI had organised the 2007 T20 World Cup victory parade in Mumbai, to what innovations would he make in the IPL, the conversation just flowed.
We discussed the 100 and its future, Indian football and why the sport stares at a grim future. Lalit narrated a number of untold IPL stories on how the league was created and nurtured.
“Controversies aren’t bad. At least you are writing about it. That’s all that matters. That you are putting it on the front page or making it breaking news is all that mattered to me,” he said. “I was also really scared, for we did not have the money to sustain it till Day 3 had things not taken off on Day 1. Also, if the IPL wasn’t played in South Africa in 2009, it wouldn’t survive,” he revealed.
He answered multiple questions from the RevSportz team of Trisha Ghosal, Gargi Raut, Rohit Juglan, Subhayan Chakraborty, Amit Shah and Rohan Das Chowdhury and of course myself. From the Kieron Pollard bid controversy to the stampede mismanagement, every topic was discussed and debated.
Some nice Indian snacks which included dhokla, a kind of vada, and some other delicacies perked up the conversation. And when we got done, a surprise was waiting. Lalit took us to his cricket room which included some fantastic memorabilia from the IPL across the years.
All in all, it was an intense day of cricket talk. Watch it on RevSportz at 12 noon.
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