PKF all set to launch pro kabaddi league

KARACHI: The Pakistan Kabaddi Federation (PKF) plans to hold its inaugural pro kabaddi league in the next few months.

The federation has initiated negotiations with an event management company and there are more chances that the league will be made possible by January or February next year.

“We are on our way to launch our league. We have already worked on it and the details will be unveiled very soon,” PKF secretary Rana Mohammad Sarwar told ‘The News’ on Friday.

In the first edition, the number of teams will be six, which could be further increased for the second edition.

Only Pakistani players will feature in the first phase as the organisers fear that including foreign players could create financial problems.

“Foreign players can take part but in that case, the expenditure will increase and that could create problems. So we have decided to go with our players only in the first edition, which will cost us around Rs40 million,” said Sarwar, who is also the secretary of the Asian Kabaddi Federation (AKF).

The league will be held in three centres of Punjab.

“Three cities are on our radar where the game is vigorously followed. In future, we can expand it to other cities and even the provinces,” the official informed.

The time frame for the first edition would be 21 days which could then be stretched to one month like what India is doing.

“We were in dire need of such a league. If it turns out to be successful, it will pave the way for a much mature league which will also feature vital foreign players,” the official said.

The league will be franchise-based and the players will be picked from the vibrant crop of the country through a bidding process which is also likely to be telecast live.

Both Pakistan and India are rated as the top sides of the world in kabaddi. India launched its league in 2014 and the event got so much popular that they held two editions this year within seven months which pulled huge viewership.

Pakistani players also play in the Indian league, but in small numbers, because of the volatile political and diplomatic relationship between the two countries.

In Pakistan, too, there is an amazing craze among people for kabaddi, particularly in Punjab, and the last two Asian Championships which were held in Lahore and POF Wah during the last three-and-a-half years attracted good crowd.

The PKF official said the inaugural league would be a real test for the organisers. “It will no doubt a real test for us and it will pave the way for holding the World Cup in future also,” the official said. “World Cup is a major event and we want to host it but for that we will need at least Rs120million because it is very much resource-intensive due to the huge prize money that it carries,” the official said.

He said that the federation was yet to receive any formal allotment signal regarding the World Cup from the world kabaddi governing body but they were ‘working in that direction’. “I request the government and corporate sector to back the federation so that the World Cup could also be hosted sometime in future,” the official conceded. So far, all the World Championships have been hosted by India in its Punjab.