BCCI secretary Devajit Saikia believes that the hasty organization of RCB’s IPL victory parade led to the tragic stampede in Bengaluru, which resulted in eleven deaths and several injuries outside the M Chinnaswamy Stadium. A large crowd had gathered to see the cricketers on Wednesday evening, leading to chaos.
Saikia referred to the Indian cricket team’s open bus victory parade in Mumbai after their T20 World Cup win last year, which went smoothly due to careful planning by the BCCI.
“When BCCI handles it, we take time and handle everything. For the T20 World Cup victory parade in Mumbai, we took some time and did it. In Bengaluru, it was done within hours, and I think that was the factor,” he told CNN-News18.
Saikia mentioned that the BCCI has no control over team celebrations after a tournament but may issue guidelines to prevent similar incidents in the future. “Whatever happened is very unfortunate. But we don’t want to play the guilty game now. BCCI looks after the event up to the award presentation ceremony after such tournaments, but from now on we will try to put at least some advisory so that such incidents do not happen,” he said.
Four officials of RCB and the event management firm DNA Entertainment Private Limited have been taken into custody in connection with the stampede. The police detained them in a joint operation by the crime branch and Bengaluru Police.
Nikhil Sosale, Head of Marketing and Revenue of RCB, along with Sunil Mathew and Kiran Kumar from DNA Entertainment Private Limited, are being questioned.
