CHENNAI: For the second time in as many years, the Indian Premier League (IPL) has been forced to consider the effects of a war. Last year, Operation Sindoor, India's military response to Pahalgam, and Pakistan's subsequent retaliation meant the league was postponed. This year, the war in West Asia, if it continues over the next few weeks, could impact IPL. How? Why? What now? Firoz Mirza/Swaroop Swaminathan take a look...
India was at war last year. Why it could be affected this year?
Roughly 20% of all of all of the world's oil and LNG (Liquified Natural Gas) flows through the Strait of Hormuz. The Strait, one of the world's most critical energy chokepoints, has been unofficially closed to a lot of traffic for at least the last week (Iran has made some concessions but, by and large, it's become a no-go zone for ships). As India imports most of its energy requirements and a lot of it comes from that region, they are staring at a energy crisis if the situation doesn't improve.
And the connection to live sporting events?
Expensive jet fuel could ground flights as supply chains could be hit in the days to come if the existing situation continues. Players may not even be able to come and there may be other factors play. If tensions continue to rise, there could be a further shock to the system in the weeks ahead. Already, a government gazette notification has made it clear of a priority, with the highest for sectors considered essential. This sector has domestic piped natural gas for household use and compressed natural gas for transport among other uses. Industrial and commercial consumers — star hotels and restaurants, for example — have been placed in Priority Sector IV. And they will receive 80% of their average consumption. And when IPL teams come calling, they usually consume a lot of energy. Some of them are over 100-strong including families of players and an army of support staff. They generally tend to take over entire floors. Hotels may not have the capacity to cater to their demands for over two months if supply chains are badly hit already.
What about petro products?
This is where it gets further complicated. At this point, the government have said they have adequate petroleum stocks and they have urged people to not panic. They have also been allowed temporary access to Russian oil by US. But if the war continues and the stocks deplete, the IPL could be forced into an uncomfortable situation with respect to games. At the moment, per association sources, a night game in the league runs up a diesel bill in the region of Rs 2,50,000 lakh (between 2500 ltrs to 3000 ltrs of diesel) just to ensure uninterrupted power supply to keep the floodlights on and production running. That makes it at least 1,50,000 litres of diesel to execute a successful season. If nothing else, the optics may look terrible.