Newly-bought Pune IPL franchise owner Sanjiv Goenka ruled out any conflict of interest over former India captain Sourav Ganguly's co-ownership of Indian Super League franchise Atletico de Kolkata and his team.
"Sourav is not been involved, that's for sure. This is entirely mine. It's 100 percent owned by me. It's me and my group of companies," Goenka clarified, following questions of potential conflict of interest being raised as Ganguly is also a member of the Indian Premier League governing council.
The highest stakeholder in ATK further said he tried to broach the topic to Ganguly on the sidelines of an ISL match, but Ganguly chose not to respond.
"You all are being hypothetical that I'm going to rope in Sourav. We have not even thought about it. There has been no dialogue or discussion with Sourav whatsoever. I was generally speaking to him about cricket and he looked away. That was in the last football match. I was generally asking him, what do you think," Goenka said.
"I asked him, 'How do you think the sponsors would respond; what was the Pune crowd like?' and he just did not respond," he said.
A passionate cricket follower, Goenka revealed that he was always keen to buy Kolkata franchise but was outbid by Bollywood heartthrob Shah Rukh Khan, the principal owner of Kolkata Knight Riders.
"You may recall that we've originally bid for the Kolkata team but Shah Rukh's bid was marginally higher than ours. We've been wanting to get into IPL for a long time. It looks like a good opportunity.
"I used to go for a lot of cricket matches as a kid. I used to follow commentary very aggressively. Cricket is something which has been a passion with me since childhood."
Introducing his son, Saswat, as a partner in the new team, he said: "Our team, Saswat and myself took that call and decided that we'll go for the bid. We look forward to your support. We've the team for two seasons and we're going to make the best out of it."
Asked about his plans, he replied: 'As of now, it's very early; we have not formulated any plans. We did not know whether we're going to win the bid or not. Till today it was about winning the bid; now it's about managing the franchise. That effort will now start. Pune, to me, makes more commercial sense out of all centres that were available. For me, it's RP Sanjiv Goenka Group."
Tight-lipped about his team and the way forward, Goenka said: "Our team will take a call. It's not for me to decide. You don't take players because you like to be photographed with someone. I'm not willing to share the budget; my team is working on it."
Asked whether he would like to bring in Mahendra Singh Dhoni since the Pune franchise being the lowest bidder will have first go at the draft, Goenka chose to be diplomatic.
"MS Dhoni, one of the finest and greatest leaders India has seen. We have not yet decided but very soon we'll decide. We have the first option of choosing the first player in the draft.
"We've to still decide who will run the cricket franchise; it may be the people who are involved with the football franchise or it may not."
On roping in former cricketers, he said: "There's no reason to preclude them either. That option is always there."
Co-owner of ATK for two seasons, Goenka further said his experience with the business of sport was outstanding.
"That connect, the emotion, it's just fantastic. It cannot be measured. I've been involved with football now I'm getting into cricket. Football and cricket are two different sports. Cricket is far more established, while football is evolving in India."
