Corporates help to end cricket’s monopoly in India

Contribution of sports-related business to improve further as India Inc raises its bets.

With large corporate houses betting big on sports beyond cricket by either picking up stakes in sports franchisees or offering sponsorships, the contribution of sports in India’s GDP growth is expected to significantly improve over the coming years.

According to KPMG, the global sports market, comprising of infrastructure, events, training, manufacturing and retailing of sports goods is estimated to be around Rs 37.8 lakh crore — Rs 44.2 lakh crore accounting for approximately one per cent of the global GDP.

The potential value of the sports infrastructure market in India is pegged at around Rs 80,000 crore with a negligible share in India’s growth as compared to about 2 per cent – 5 per cent growth in more developed countries like US.

“We expect the contribution of sports in India’s growth to increase by 0.20 per cent –0.50 per cent annually for the next four years. With the kind of interest shown by corporate houses in sports such as Kabbadi, Badminton, Football and wrestling among others, we believe the business of sports would account for almost 1 per cent of the local GDP by 2020,” said Ninad Karpe, managing director and chief executive officer (CEO) of Aptech Ltd, while speaking on the sidelines of a summit on the business of sports and entertainment organised by CII.

Joining the discussion, Shrinivas Dempo, chairman and managing director of Dempo Shipbuilding & Engineering said that the wider acceptance and growing popularity of sports would not only attract higher investment in sports infrastructure and sports goods, but it would also have a very positive impact on the real estate and tourism sectors in the country.

The success of Indian Premier League has led to the rise of several other leagues in India like the Indian Super league (Football), Pro Kabbadi League, International Premier Tennis League (IPTL) and Pro Wrestling League (PWL).

There are currently eleven operational leagues in the country with nine of them getting launched in the last three years.

KPMG noted that the inaugural season of ISL witnessed an impressive cumulative TV viewership of 429 millions in 2014, which further grew 26 per cent in the 2015 season.

The average attendance of ISL’s first season was 24,357, only below three of the worlds’s biggest football leagues (Germany’s Bundesliga, Spains’ La Liga and the English Premier League).

Similarly, around 435 million people watched the first season of PKL in 2014 and its viewership increased 20 per cent in its second season and 35 per cent in its third season.

“It is very encouraging to see that Kabbadi, a traditional rural sport is attracting urban audience and getting acceptance on a pan India basis.

“Till a few years back, we didn’t achieve success in commercialising sports beyond cricket.

Commercialisation of sports is the only way to attract and nurture talent and climb up the ladder,” said Praful Patel, president, All India Football Federation.