CHANDIGARH: The Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) recently announced the schedule for Indian Premier League (IPL), 2021, from March 7. Due to the global pandemic, the entire tournament will be held in six venues only Ahmedabad, Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi, Mumbai, and Kolkata.
Through this, the BCCI decided to get rid of home games.
Raising this issue, Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh said that they wrote a mail to BCCI for considering Mohali as a venue as well. He added that they are ready to take every precaution for the tournament.
The Chief Minister also snapped at BCCI for including Mumbai as a venue that is reporting over 9,000 COVID-19 cases daily.
“I have written to them (BCCI) saying if they can have a match in Mumbai, which has had 9,000 cases per day, then what’s wrong with Mohali. We will take the necessary precautions: Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh on IPL excluding Mohali as match venue.” ANI tweeted.
In addition to this, during a press conference, the Chief Minister was questioned about the exclusion of PCA Stadium, Mohali, from IPL venues for forthcoming session.
To this, the Chief Minister said, that he had already tweeted to express his resentment. “If Mumbai Stadium could be a venue with more than 10000 cases a day why should Mohali be ignored, he asked, adding that the state government had already assured of all arrangements to ensure strict compliance with Covid protocols at Mohali”.
However, the BCCI had earlier clarified that the main reason for hosting any match in Punjab is due to the ongoing farmers protest, and they do not want the protestors to disrupt any game held at the venue, during the tournament.
“We don’t want a situation to arise where we have an IPL match in Mohali and a farmer agitation march moves towards the stadium. It will attract media attention from all over the world. We don’t want such a situation to arise. Mohali is not among shortlisted venues due to the current scenario in the northern part of India,” a BCCI official had said.