Express News Service
NEW DELHI: The All India Chess Federation’s (AICF) plan to hold ‘Online Chess League’ and ‘Chess in School’ has run into rough weather with bidders accusing it of opacity regarding qualifying criteria for becoming franchises.
The AICF has decided to hold the Indian Chess League (ICL) from June 2022 on the lines of the hugely popular Indian Premier League (IPL) organised by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). Like the IPL, the ICL will have multiple franchises owning multiple players from India and abroad. The event is expected to generate thousands of crores of rupees in revenue.
Along with the ICL, the AICF plans to start two more events namely, the ‘Online Chess League’ and ‘Chess in School’. An advertisement was issued earlier this month inviting expression of interest (EOI). The lack of details in this advertisement has left the prospective bidders puzzled.
The advertisement reads as follows: “The All India Chess Federation invites companies to submit an expression of Interest for a proposed Online Chess League and partner in Chess in School programme to take place from 2022. Interested experienced parties having sound financial background may submit their applications with complete details to email: indianchessfed@gmail.com by 25th December 2021.”
This advertisement is also available at the AICF website aicf.in. Apart from the lack of clarity on “sound financial background” and “complete details”, prospective bidders found the absence of a request for proposal, which is usually put out to describe the scope of work, financial arrangements and qualifying criteria, surprising. Neither was any pre-bid meeting held to give details of the project.
Replies from AICF to the enquiries by prospective bidders have further confounded them. When a bidder wrote to the honorary secretary of the AICF, Bharat Singh Chauhan, proposing to make a presentation regarding their “ability to conceive, implement and execute successfully the Online Chess league and be a partner in Chess in School programme”, the answer from AICF talked only about the Online Chess League and gave a complete miss to the Chess in School programme.
Money deposit deadline approaches, chess body still to reply to bidder’s queries
This made the bidder wonder if the AICF was not entertaining any bids for the Chess in School programme. Many other anxious bidders have shot off letters to the AICF. Underlining that “everything looked very arbitrary and confusing”, a bidder asked the AICF to provide the following details “transparently and clearly”:
1) What is the process of bidding?2) What is the financial model? Is it revenue sharing?3) For what period the franchise is being offered?4) Does the successful bidder get exclusive right to conduct, broadcast, record, advertise, merchandise, and enter into endorsement/ support/sponsorship contracts with players?5) Can the bidder get third party sponsorship for broadcasting, advertising, and paying player fee?6) What is meant by online chess league; how will it be organised, and in how many states?7) Has the software for this already been developed; or is it yet to be developed; who will develop it?8) Who will bear the expenses of events, judges, venue, etc? The AICF is yet to reply to the queries even as the deadline for earnest money deposit (EMD) ends on Wednesday (Dec 29).
A questionnaire sent by this paper to the AICF president, Dr Sanjay Kapoor, on December 24 elicited no response till the time of writing this. Speaking to this correspondent, a bidder said the AICF was copying the BCCI style of functioning that led to the Supreme Court setting up the Lodha committee to regulate its functioning in order to ensure transparency and integrity. He said the AICF would not be allowed to choose the franchise in this non-transparent and arbitrary manner.
“We will go to court if we have to,” he said, requesting not to be named. The ICL was announced on December 14, this year by the AICF president. He said “the Indian Chess League is going to change the face of chess in the country. It will help us attain our goal of becoming world No 1 in the near future.” He said this first of its kind six-team franchise event will take place over two weeks in a double round-robin format in one or two cities.
The top two teams will clash in the finals. Each team will consist of eight players, including two Super Grandmasters, two Indian Grandmasters, two Women Grandmasters and one Junior Indian boy and girl each. Speaking on the occasion, AICF secretary Bharat Singh said “We will announce the criteria for becoming a franchise owner shortly.”
Bland advertisementProspective bidders are wondering what the AICF meant by “sound financial background” and what “complete details” they were required to provide in order to qualify as a successful bidder
