Hockey India League announces new franchisee for third season

Hockey India League Chairman Dr. Narinder Batra

New team announced

Indian hockey fans got some respite from on going troubles when Hockey India League announced its new fransee for season three. This news comes after two teams, Dabur owned Mumbai Magicians and winner of first edition of tournament Ranchi Rhinos pulled out their teams due to low ROI and differences with Hockey India.

New HIL franchisee will be based at Pune and is owned by Mr. Anirban Sarkar, owner of Deccan Water Treatment Private Limited. An avid fan of hockey since his school days in Pune, Anirban Sarkar decided to enter HIL in order to improve the future of hockey in the country. Mr. Sarkar has been closely following Narinder Batra and Hockey India's he decided to enter the field and support the game.

Mr. Anirban Sarkar Sarkar said: “Having closely and sincerely following the developments of Hockey in our country under the leadership of Dr. Narinder Batra, I was very impressed and felt a need to be a part and contribute to the sport”. Having a love and passion for Hockey since his school days in Pune, Mr Sarkar says that the city has produced many Hockey Stars for India. “The cradle for Hockey in India has seen stars like Baboo Nimal, Joseph Philips, Dhanraj Pillay, Vikram Pillay and many International and national players and I too grew up like many other Pune boys playing for my school in interschool and Zilla parishad matches with borrowed hockey sticks from friends. Buying the Pune franchise is the just the beginning for a larger and better future for the sport in the country.”

Exciting times ahead

Speaking on the announcement Hockey India Secretary-General and Hero Hockey India League Chairman Dr. Narinder Batra said “We welcome Deccan Water Treatment and Mr. Sarkar as the new franchise for next season’s Hockey India League. These are exciting times for us as a new city will be able to witness the International tournament and the amount of people we will be reaching out too will also be more in number.”

Deccan Water Treatment Pvt Ltd. is a pioneer in the manufacture of R.O. Systems for drinking water specialized in desalination, defluoridation and arsenic removal. Starting with package STPs, the company graduated to technologically savvy sewage treatment options like Suspended Media Bio Reactor (SMBR) and Sludge Return Bio Reactor (SRBR), which have been immensely successful. Without resting on its laurels, the company diversified into treatment of sewage through Ultra Violet rays by indigenously developed Floating Bed Catalytic Reactor wherein the treated sewage is fit for recycling and reuse in flushing and gardening, without any tertiary treatment.Following the exponential growth in the field of water and waste water treatment during the last 14 years, we have now diversified into new emerging area called the Solar energy.

Deccan Water Treatment Pvt Ltd has been supporting hockey in India and recently they played sponsors to 4th Sub-Junior National Hockey Championship. This news of Pune coming in as a new franchisee is quite a shock as the city does not have a stadium to host the matches and same was communicated by HIL chairman Narinder Batra few days ago.

It is also learnt that Pune will replace Ranchi Rhinos in HIL while a new investor is being sought for the Mumbai franchisee.

Pulling out of two teams means, the mini-auction which is supposed to happen next month became much bigger with exciting talent like Manpreet Singh, Mortiz Fuertse and PR Sreejesh in the auction pool.

Third season of Hero Hockey Indiea League will begin in January 2015.