Building cricket teams: From maharajas to business houses in the IPL

The dust from the Indian Premier League (IPL) auction is slowly settling down. Well, it definitely was more like gold dust for the players involved who got multi-crore deals.

More than Rs 550 crores were spent by the ten IPL franchises to purchase stars and upcoming players. As many as nine players got a deal in excess of Rs 10 crores, with Ishan Kishan being bought by the Mumbai Indians at Rs 15.25 crores. He was the player who received the highest bid during the event.

There has been some criticism on the social significance of such bidding and the purchase of cricketers as it happened in the IPL auction. Is it fine to use words like 'sold' and 'bid' while talking about people?

However, even critics of the IPL or its auction can’t deny the financial security that it has provided players. The other side of this security is when these audacious sums of money start talking and the players stop focusing on the game.

Is this phenomenon of purchasing players to build one’s team something new in Indian cricket? It isn’t. It is safe to say this has been going on subtly since the very beginning of the game in the country.

Take, for instance, the erstwhile cricket team of Holkars. It was Maharaja Yashwantrao Holkar’s vision to have a quality cricket team, and for this, he brought in Col. CK Nayudu. India’s first Test captain was asked to move to Indore and set up a cricket team for the state. He was also commissioned as an officer in the Holkar army but his primary job was cricket.

CK (as he was called) had a free hand in cricketing matters and handpicked players from across the country to build the Holkar team. Holkars became a prominent outfit and won the Ranji Trophy four times between 1945 and 1952.

There is a similar case with the Baroda team. Maharaja Sayajirao Gaekwad III was a big cricket buff and he left no stone unturned for the development of the game in his state.

His son Maharaja Pratap Singh Gaekwad carried on the legacy and got in players like Amir Elahi, Gul Mohammad, CS Nayudu, Vijay Hazare and Chandu Borde among others to build a strong cricket team. He had local star and former Indian captain Dattajirao Gaekwad to guide the team.

The Baroda team were Ranji champions on four occasions between 1942 and 1958.

Then, of course, there is Maharaja Bhupinder Singh, whose contribution to Indian cricket is immense. There are many more examples of Indian kings and princes supporting the game as well as having teams of their own.

In all these cases, the expenses of the players were taken care of by the maharajas, who were on the payrolls of the royals.

So, how does that equate to today’s scenario in the IPL? Some would say that the royals have been replaced by business houses. Instead of working in the kingdom or the army of the maharajas, players are given the moolah directly by the IPL franchises. Most things sans the open auction remain the same.

Now whether the auction happens again or is scrapped is something for the authorities to decide. Cricket fans will just hope that, in some form or the other, these business tycoons who own the IPL teams work for the betterment of the game in the country.