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The IPL is India’s prime-time addiction

March 26, 2025
<a href="https://revsportz.in/author/boria/" rel="author" class="url fn n" itemprop="url"><img alt='' src='https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/e660b408ca5a915f1c718d0cd98a879b?s=32&d=mm&r=g' srcset='https://secure.gravatar.com/avatar/e660b408ca5a915f1c718d0cd98a879b?s=64&d=mm&r=g 2x' class='avatar avatar-32 photo' height='32' width='32' decoding='async'/> <span class="" itemprop="name">Boria Majumdar</span></a>
KKR players praying to the stumps at Eden Gardens (Image: KKR)

In a photograph that went viral on social media last week, KKR players were seen at the Eden Gardens seeking blessings by praying to the stumps ahead of the start of the season. That act sums up the IPL perfectly. At its core, it remains very Indian, and is the perfect mesh of the traditional and the modern.

Over the course of the 17 years since the inception of the IPL, I have spent time with multiple teams and owners and been amazed at the kind of passion the league generates. Prashad is often passed on to the team members hours before the game, and everything from vaastu to feng shui to prayers is tried out. Some play the conch shell thrice before the team leave the hotel for the ground. Team names and jersey colours have been altered to align better with the stars, and it is fandom of a very distinct nature that makes the IPL a very different beast in comparison to international cricket.

While retaining a very unique kind of Indianness at its core, the IPL has fundamentally transformed the economy of cricket. The question then is why is the IPL considered a safer investment than even the World Cup?

With the IPL, you can’t go wrong. The moment the tournament is on, you have close to half a billion assured eyeballs every single day. And most importantly, each one of them will come back the next day and will sleep happy. Even if you are an RCB fan and the team have lost to CSK, you won’t be too unhappy, for you are also an MS Dhoni fan. “There is something in it for everyone,” said a leading executive and that’s what makes the IPL the BCCI’s biggest calling card.

 

There’s little doubt that April 18, 2008, will go down in cricket history as the date when the game changed forever. The IPL is also the only platform where the best of corporate India take each other on in the full public glare. Much rides on winning an IPL title, and at times, the pressures get manifested in people’s behavioural patterns during closely contested games.

And may I say, all of this adds to the charm of the IPL and will continue to do so going forward. It is a mix of all these dynamics that makes the IPL the phenomenon that it is. A brand that has only grown bigger, and will stay centre stage in India for the next two months.

The truth is that it is now a prime-time addiction for sports fans across the country. A spectacle of the very best quality that is consumed and celebrated  pan-India. Body clocks are adjusted based on IPL timings. People go to bed past midnight and get up late to work around the IPL schedule. Lifestyles change, work patterns get modified, and priorities are altered.

The players are objects of consumption for prime-time television, which provides us all with our daily dose of entertainment and relaxation. They are like commodities on display each evening, without which cricket’s biggest global extravaganza stands to lose its sheen. And that’s why they need to be celebrated and appreciated that much more.