IPL Dictates the Media and Entertainment Business

Before start writing anything I must say, if you are die heart fan on cricket or IPL then this article may hurt your feelings. But this is my personal view and I don’t have intention to hurt anybody’s feeling. I have said this because in India cricket is like a totally different culture in itself, people pray all day for team performance and can leave their work if they get a chance to watch cricket match.
Few years back a new format of 20 over in cricket is introduced by Zee entertainment owner subhash Chandra, who started his own league. But just before it got its pace our dear Lalit modi copied it and to suppress the zee league he got approval from international cricket council using Board of Control for Cricket in India route. He became a star in the world of cricket as such sort format was never there in international cricket and he is now called as father of 20-20 format. And journey of 20-20 cricket picked up its pace from there and BCCI introduced an IPL (Indian premier league). No doubt it’s a great format of cricket as you don’t have to watch the game for 5 days or say one whole day; it’s just finished in 40 overs with full energy.

A much hyped format of cricket IPL I feel was totally ruling and in turn dictating the media and entertainment business. Take the example of 2010 IPL season, in spite various controversies with media it is always in the top news on any news channel. All news channels were getting mad to show any different news on IPL by paying huge fee /charges etc to IPL officials or to other people. I couldn’t recall any new TV serial or any new or old much famous reality shows on the TV channels. They even didn’t telecast any premier of good movies in that period. Where suddenly they are gone all together, either nobody dares to take the risk against IPL matches or they are already well paid off to not introduce any new serial.

Lets take the example of parallel culture in culture i.e. Bollywood. Even they didn’t have any guts to release any good movie in that period. Not many low budget movies were released in that time. Bollywood directors are always debating about their skills to attract audiences in cinema but where they all gone during this period. Even print media was giving great amount of support to promote IPL and increase its TRP. 30 % of newspaper was consisting of some or the other news related to IPL. TV channels and cinema people were always talking about interest of the audience and them always arguing that they wanted to provide best to the viewers and entertain them with variety of serials and movies.

Whole scenario is somehow indigestible to me, that nobody in the whole entertainment industry ready to take any risk. So I am bound to think of the other option that they are well paid off to keep their mouth shut and internally push IPL because of huge amount of money involved in it.

Adding one more view to the game cricket, that people are mad about this game and only BCCI is reaping its benefit. BCCI because of the fact that it is richest cricket club, now one of the richest sports club, is dictating the ruling the world cricket. My first question to them is why not to use this game for the improvement of the country. Watching the cricket match and taking india flags in the match is not even close to any patriotism but people still have that sentiment that it’s a part of their patriotism.

I feel if cricket really have to do something then people have to think of some innovative idea to handle some national issues. Just to share one example which one of my teachers (Prof. Iyer) shared in my MBA class was the case of Brazil. Brazil has used soccer to handle spreading of drug addiction among young people. Govt. had introduced a rule that students who play soccer after school will get extra marks. And result of this is students who were drug addicts, because they have extra time and they didn’t have anything to do, they started playing soccer for extra grades and then they didn’t have extra time and energy to get attracted toward drugs. This step gave great result to Brazil. Why can’t India also tries some innovative idea to fight back some of its national problems and let BCCI supports such idea for the improvement of the country and then it was not just about money and will form a really a great example of patriotism.

Bihar is one of the most neglected States Inspite of having high potential

Whenever we talk about Bihar, the only picture comes in our mind is of some labor, illiterate and poor peoples OR our great politician Lalu Prasad yadav. Just for the information that maximum number of IAS officer in India are from Bihar, Maximum IITians from a single state are Bihari. Most of the industries will stop functioning without Bihari labor force and most of the infrastructure projects will come to halt without Biharis. They may not be directly involved in country GDP but without them no industry will work properly and GDP & growth of India will be declined. So my comment on this is Bihar people are contributing most in increasing GDP of India despite of the fact that they are living BPL (Below poverty line).

But one question always arises in my mind that facts says that most IAS and IITians and many IIM students are from Bihar but then why they never look back to their state and try to improve it. They have the power they have the money they have the fresh mind to implement fresh ideas to improve the state. Are they shameful of being Bihari OR they are worried that if they tried to do that then they will be kidnapped by some local mafia and ask for sum of money from their family to release them.

Industries in all parts of India have Bihari labor like Punjab, Haryana, Delhi, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Gujarat etc. But not many industrialists thought to open their factory in Bihar and just exploit them outside their state. We should not just blame them but see the reality on why it is not happening. Most important reason I feel is Law and order condition in Bihar but even worst is nobody is working on it to improve it. Other reason is political condition in Bihar, who controls most of the mafias. We really need to think on this and take few steps to improve it.

One more example on neglecting of the state I remember is Flood in Kosi River. Just take the count of people who are affected by this every year but nobody is pushing to find solution of this problem or planning of some DAM etc. Water is logged in many areas for a month but they are not provided with any help by the government. I am taking this opportunity to compare this flood with flood in Mumbai, the kind of attention people in Mumbai have got. T.V and media also had given focus on Mumbai because of its glamour and to maintain their TRP of their channel.

Government should take strong steps to improve the state. Firstly, Maintain Law and order condition in the state which in turn build confidence in the business community to setup companies. Secondly, govt. should improve the education level in the state. India is saying to the world that India have maximum number of young people so its future is bright but they never publish the figures of people who are educated and will be useful to India growth. Many people in the age group of 20-30 which govt. is claiming to be the young generation are uneducated and not very useful. Thirdly, steps would be taken to control population in the backward areas of Bihar. Because many people in Bihar still think that more the number of children more the working hands in the family but they never plan to feed them food. Once while watching news channel some govt. have installed a condom machines in call centers to control population and HIV disease. I feel why they are installing it in educated community and not in the uneducated community who need it the most.

One final point I want to make is State grows only with good leadership. And country develops not with penetration of TV / Plasma TV, increasing standard of living of people but it should grow if there are less number of people below poverty line and they don’t have to fight for basics (food, cloth, shelter).