Deccan Chargers send legal notice to BCCI, threaten to skip IPL

Deccan Chargers slapped a legal notice on the Indian Premier League on Monday and threatened to skip the third edition of the Twenty20 league beginning next month if its home matches are not re-allotted to Hyderabad and Vishakapatnam.

Deccan Chargers slapped a legal notice on the Indian Premier League on Monday and threatened to skip the third edition of the Twenty20 league beginning next month if its home matches are not re-allotted to Hyderabad and Vishakapatnam.

HT Image

In a legal notice sent to BCCI president Shashank Manohar, Deccan Chargers' solicitors have asked the cash-awash league's authorities to reconsider their decision of relocating the home matches of the defending champions to Hyderabad and Vishakapatnam.

The notice claimed that the decision to shift the matches have been taken "arbitrarily, unilaterally, without our client's consent and in complete breach of the Franchise Agreement dated April 10, 2008 pursuant to which the rights and obligations of both the parties i.e. BCCI-IPL and the Franchisee, i.e. Our client are governed".

The notice further charged IPL that the decision to shift the matches was against the objective of having franchisees from various regions of the country and against public interest and consequently was not acceptable to Deccan Chargers.

IPL Commissioner Lalit Modi had initially announced only the shifting of the opening match between Deccan Chargers and Kolkata Knight Riders, as well as the gala dinner, from Hyderabad to Navi Mumbai's DY Patil Stadium.

However, a couple of days ago he posted in his Twitter page about the decision to relocate the other six home matches of DC too from Hyderabad and Vizag to Navi Mumbai and Nagpur.

In the revised schedule available on IPL's website (iplt20.com) neither Hyderabad nor Vizag is to host any match.

More than a dozen changes have been made in the original schedule of the cash-rich league to incorporate the shifting of all the home matches of Deccan Chargers.

As per the revised schedule, the two semi-finals are to be held in Bangalore (April 21 and 22) and the final, as well as the 3rd place tie, are to be played at the DY Patil Stadium on April 24 and 25 respectively.

The first IPL was held in India and became a huge hit but the second edition was moved to South Africa as it clashed with the General Elections.