"IPL Auctions are a fantastic ride down an untamed river": Charu Sharma

12) On a final unrelated note: You must be following the developments in Indian volleyball. First, the decision by Baseline to launch a completely private league, followed by the Volleyball Federation now announcing its own league. Your thoughts on this ongoing saga?

The whole earlier part of the Pro Volleyball League was very unfortunate that it had to fold up because of a lack of clarity between the federation and Joy & Co (the organizers from Baseline). Now obviously, somewhere along the way, the relationships were a little awkward and the matter could not be resolved and it had to go to court. That’s just very unfortunate because it cast a very gloomy shadow on the whole sport and everything that surrounds the sport. So I felt very sorry that such a great effort for volleyball was lost in this problem between the federation and Joy & Co.

I’m not blaming anyone. I’m just saying it is very unfortunate.

But for them (Baseline) to come back and rise like a phoenix out of ashes… Brilliant ya! The fact that they got the support of all the players is also very new in our part of the world. Because a lot of players owe a lot to the federation and the local associations. They are loathe to play in any kind of private effort because then there’s revenge saying you can’t play this, we will not take you for that.

I do think professional leagues are the way to go in terms of creating a livelihood for players of a lot of sports in every part of the world. Federations need to give a helping hand. If the federations are not forward looking, if they are loathe to give up the so-called power of being the custodians of that particular sport… Then this partnership will never happen.

We were very fortunate that the Kabaddi Federation trusted me… Knew what we were doing and realized that we were not going against what they were doing. We were just assisting the sport to grow.

13) What Baseline is doing is a very bold experiment. PVL could be the first "private" league in India that succeeds without federation support…

Correct… Which will be a massive game changer in India if there are no repercussions. If all these players who are playing [in PVL] are allowed to play elsewhere…if all the overseas players are allowed in and overseas federations are happy to send their players to an Indian league which is "private"… Then I think the sky is the limit!