Fear of BCCI backlash, ECB turns down Lalit Modi offer to buy "The Hundred": Reports
London: Unwilling to jeopardise its cordial relationship with the all-powerful BCCI, the England and Wales Cricket Board (ECB) has rejected a lucrative 10-year buy-out offer of their franchise-based property 'The Hundred' from former IPL commissioner Lalit Modi, the Daily Telegraph reported.
Modi received a life ban from the BCCI in 2013 for "serious misconduct and indiscipline" related to bids for two new IPL franchises in 2010. Modi left India and has been living in London since then.
Modi had planned the competition in peak English summer between July 1-August 15.
"Modi's representatives met with Vikram Banerjee, the England and Wales Cricket Board's director of operations, who is de facto head of the Hundred, and chief executive Richard Gould to lay out a 10-year offer to buy the Hundred and fund it through private investment. However, the ECB will not be pursuing talks with Modi," the British daily reported.
The ECB isn't ready to completely let go its ownership on their flagship property but also at the same time is worried about potential pitfalls of a partnership as "dealing with Modi would jeopardise its relationship with the BCCI."
It must be noted that the ECB had received a similar offer from the Bridgepoint Group worth GBP 400 million for a 75 per cent stake in 'The Hundred'.
"At the time, Richard Thompson, the ECB's chairman, said he would only consider offers of a "few billion" and since then the ECB has pursued a strategy of selling equity in the teams, with the board retaining ownership of the competition," the newspaper further reported.
Modi told Telegraph Sport that "he has lined up investors willing to pump money into a 10-team tournament but told the ECB the Hundred format does not work and should be converted into a Twenty20 competition instead."
The team purse as per offer sheet would have been USD 10 million per season (roughly INR 83 crore to IPL's INR 95 Cr).
Modi's estimated valuation of the competition was earmarked at USD 100 million a year over 10 years.
In fact, the former IPL czar had advised ECB not to invite more than two IPL franchises to own teams.
His mantra was "franchises should be English owned and English run with minimal input from India."
Modi had been in touch with English cricket establishment for the past 18 months and wanted to make it second biggest league after IPL.
"I would give them a guarantee of a billion dollars," Modi told Telegraph Sport.
"A lot of people have been in touch with me interested in backing it and I made a proposal to the ECB but it had a lot of conditions. The Hundred format does not work and there should only be two franchises sold to Indian buyers. It will only work if it is an English competition and not Indo-centric," he said.
The ECB believes it can raise GBP 100 million from selling equity (shares).
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Jharkhand horror: Man kills live-in partner, chops body into 40 pieces
Ranchi (PTI): A 25-year-old man, who works as a butcher, allegedly strangled to death his live-in partner and chopped her body into 40 to 50 pieces in a forested area in Jharkhand’s Khunti district, police said on Wednesday.
The accused, identified as Naresh Bhengra, was arrested.
The matter came to light after around a fortnight after the killing when a stray dog was found with human body parts near Jordag village in Jariagarh police station on November 24.
Bhengra was in a live-in relationship with the deceased, a 24-year-old woman also from Khunti district, in Tamil Nadu for the past couple of years. Sometime back, he returned to Jharkhand, got married to another woman without telling his partner anything and went back to the southern state without his wife to join her.
"The brutal incident occurred on November 8 when they reached Khunti as the accused who had married another woman did not wish to take her home. Instead, he took her to a forest near his house at Jordag village in Jariagarh police station and chopped the body into pieces. The man has been arrested," Khunti Superintendent of Police Aman Kumar told PTI.
Inspector Ashok Singh who investigated the case said the man worked in a butcher shop in Tamil Nadu and was expert in slicing chicken.
“He admitted chopping the body parts of the woman into 40 to 50 pieces before leaving those in the forest for wild animals to feast on. The police recovered several parts on November 24 after a dog in the area was seen with a hand," Singh told PTI.
Singh said that the woman, who was unaware of his marriage, pressured him to return to Khunti. After reaching Ranchi, they boarded a train on November 24 and headed to the man's village.
"Under a plan, the man took her to Khunti in an autorickshaw near his home and asked her to wait. He returned with sharp weapons and strangulated her with her dupatta after raping her. He then cut the body into 40 to 50 pieces and left for his home to live with his wife," Singh said.
The woman, however, had informed her mother that she had boarded a train and would be living with her partner, the police officer said.
Following the recovery of body parts, a bag was also found in the forest with the murdered woman's belongings including her Aadhaar card. The mother of the woman was called at the spot and she identified her daughter's belongings.
"The mother suspected the man behind the crime who after being nabbed by the police admitted to chopping the woman into pieces," the official added.
The incident has sent shockwaves among people in the region, with the Shraddha Walker murder case of 2022 still fresh in their memory.
Walker was killed by her live-in partner who chopped her body into pieces before dumping them in the jungle in South Delhi’s Mehrauli.
