Brisk business for touts

Increasing Demand

Like all successful events, the Indian Premiere League (IPL) has a seamier side to it. At every IPL match scheduled in the City, there are the black marketeers who mill around the stadium. What’s more, there are people willing to pay through their noses to buy tickets in black.

There are just two more IPL matches scheduled to be held in the City and the demand for the tickets are on the rise. The tickets — for both Tuesday’s match between the Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) and Kings XI Punjab and Saturday’s match against Chennai Super Kings — have been sold out. 

With an IPL ticket costing Rs 850 selling at 1,500, and those costing Rs 2,700 selling at Rs 3,300, the black marketeers know that this is a once-in-a-blue-moon opportunity. They go around discreetly and woo people who don’t get tickets but are eager to watch the match.

They bargain long and hard and all the tickets are sold at the best price. The black marketeers begin operating almost an hour prior to the match and their numbers increase closer to the start of the game.

Metrolife did a reality check and found out that there were tickets sold in black at all the gates of Chinnaswamy Stadium — for anything between Rs 1,500 and Rs 3,500.

The black market thrived during the last season of the IPL as well, but was a bit more discreet. This year, not only have the touts visibly increased but they’re selling tickets openly. IPL fans feel that this is not a healthy trend and must be controlled. Srinivas, a student, states that one must go through the right channel to get the ticket. “It’s only encouraging them to make more money in the wrong way. People should try and find the right way to get the passes. This year, the online system has been very good and people were able to plan better when it came to buying tickets,” he adds. 

Moulya, another student, says that it’s the hype around the game that pushes people to buy tickets. “Everybody wants to be a part of the IPL and when they don’t get the tickets or have the patience to stand in long queues, they end up turning to touts for tickets.

This is a bad trend because we are talking about eliminating corruption. Encouraging those selling tickets in black will only make matters worse. People should be more responsible and do what is right,” she says.  

Joy Somanna, who lives in the United States, is here on vacation and decided to watch an IPL match. “It was a little difficult to get tickets at first but rather than buying them in black, I decided to ask my friend to give me some complimentary passes. It’s not right to promote black marketing of tickets,” he says.

Siddharth Singhvi, another IPL regular, feels that selling tickets in black is not only an offence but an insult to the game of cricket.

“The cops must be more vigilant when it comes to checking for tickets being sold in black. There must be some identification code to differentiate the real tickets from those sold in black,” he signs off.