Boria Majumdar in Birmingham
Lalit Modi is a feisty character. And I have always loved asking him the tough questions. Enjoyed pushing him. Unless you question Lalit and challenge him, you will never get him to open up. I have always believed that while Lalit should be credited for setting up the IPL, he subsequently became bigger than the brand and paid the price. The brand is always bigger than an individual and that includes Lalit Modi. So while there could be no IPL without Lalit, it is also true that the brand was thereafter good enough to survive and grow without him.
You tell him this and he agrees. And while he is hugely proud of what he has created, deep down there was always a sense of insecurity and nervousness. Lalit or the BCCI did not have money to market the IPL and manipulate the media in its first year. In fact, many in the media, including myself, were sceptical. That’s where the product was marketed well.
“I made sure that you criticised me,” quipped Lalit. “That you wrote bad things. Questioned the property and challenged it. That’s why I cancelled your accreditation. There was no way you would write good things about the property. So if I laid out the red carpet for you, you’d take me for granted and do nothing. Rather, if I pushed you and stopped you from coming, it was natural that you’d come after me and fight. That’s what I wanted. In the fight, you will at least write about the IPL. Make it front page news. Make it breaking news. People, and your fans, would read and know about it. Bad or good I needed you to write.”
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In normal circumstances if people speak bad about us or say things which are negative we feel angry or frustrated. Not so Lalit. He wanted it, for it was the only way the IPL would become a blockbuster.
“If you see Indian cinema since Sholay, every major film has shades of grey. There has to be dark for it to become a blockbuster. News anchors needed to come after me at 9 pm and shout. It was free publicity at primetime. My job was done. I had a brand from nowhere,” Lalit recounted.
Also Read: Lalit Modi on the IPL’s Unforeseen Impact
The best was this one…
“Sony did not have the reach in 2008. They weren’t good enough at the start. I knew that with their reach, the property would go nowhere. I opened the signal. I told everyone to steal it. Cut into the live coverage and no one will say a word. Sony was mad. I remember the president of Sony calling me and saying what was I doing? They had spent money and it could harm them. I made him understand things. The moment people loved the property, I had a brand. Then, we’d close the signal again. And the moment we did so, fans would push the cable operators to subscribe to Sony. But for them to do so, they needed a taste of what we were doing. The plan worked and the IPL became what it is.”
How was that for business? No wonder the IPL is the perfect business school case study.
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