All IPL teams violated Companies Act: Khurshid

NEW DELHI - All the eight teams of the Indian Premier League (IPL) have not complied with certain provisions of the Companies Act and are liable for penal action, Corporate Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid informed the Rajya Sabha Thursday.

“The preliminary information/reports have indicated non-compliance of certain provisions of the Companies Act, 1956, by the IPL franchisees,” Khurshid said in a written reply.

All the IPL teams, including their franchisees, were named by Khurshid in his answer to a question on whether his ministry was conducting a probe into alleged irregularities by the team owners.

Among the teams are: Mumbai Indians owned by Indiawin Sports, Royal Challengers Bangalore (Royal Challengers Sports), Deccan Chargers (Deccan Chargers Sporting Ventures), Chennai Super Kings (India Cements), Delhi Daredevils (GMR Sports) and Kings XI Punjab (KPH Dream Cricket).

The other violators of the Act were actor Shahrukh Khan, co-promoter of Knight Rider Sports which owns the Kolkata Knight Riders, Rajasthan Royals’s owner Jaipur IPL Cricket, and two new franchisees - Sahara Pune Warriors of Sahara Adventure Sports and Rendezvous Sports, which owns the Kochi team.

“The Registrar of Companies has been instructed to scrutinize the documents of the companies under section 234 of the Companies Act, 1956 and take penal action, wherever warranted,” said Khurshid.

The controversy over IPL team ownerships, which were hazy to start with, were sparked off by reports that former junior external affairs minister Shashi Tharoor’s friend Sunanda Pushkar had received sweat equity in the Kochi team.

The resulting turmoil saw Tharoor quitting office and that opened up a pandora’s box of irregularities and alleged kickbacks.