Tag: Ahmedabad

  • Shah Rukh Khan discharged from hospital after suffering heat stroke

    Shah Rukh Khan discharged from hospital after suffering heat stroke

    Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan has been discharged from a hospital in Ahmedabad on Wednesday after receiving treatment for a heat stroke.

    According to police officials, the Bollywood star might leave the hospital on Thursday, although there has been no statement from the hospital about his health.

    On Tuesday, SRK was in Ahmedabad to watch an Indian Premier League (IPL) match of his team, the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR), at Narendra Modi Stadium.

    The police official said, “Khan is still receiving treatment at the hospital. He might leave today.”

    Shah Rukh’s co-star and co-owner of KKR, Juhi Chawla, also provided a health update about the superstar.

    Speaking to News18, Juhi said, “Shah Rukh was not feeling too well last night, but he is being taken care of and was feeling much better this evening.”

    She added, “God willing, he will soon be up and in the stands on the weekend, cheering the team as we play the finals.”

  • Cummins urges Australia to ’embrace’ India crowd challenge in World Cup final

    Cummins urges Australia to ’embrace’ India crowd challenge in World Cup final

     Australia captain Pat Cummins has urged his side to “embrace” the challenge of facing a hostile crowd when they play in-form hosts India in Sunday’s World Cup final in Ahmedabad.

    A capacity crowd of 130,000 — which would be a record for any cricket match — is expected to roar on India, who have won all 10 of their matches en route to the showpiece game.

    The hosts are bidding for a third men’s one-day international World Cup title and second on home soil after their 2011 triumph.

    But five-time champions Australia are a team full of big-match performers who also know what it’s like to play in cricket-crazy India from their time in the Indian Premier League.

    “I think you’ve got to embrace it, the crowd’s obviously going to be very one-sided,” Cummins told a pre-match news conference at the Narendra Modi Stadium, named after the Indian prime minister, on Saturday.

    “But also in sport, there’s nothing more satisfying (as an opposition player) than hearing a big crowd go silent and that’s the aim for us tomorrow.”

    The 30-year-old fast bowler added: “You’ve just got to embrace every part of it, every part of a final — you know in the lead-up there’s going to be noise and more people and interest and you just can’t get overwhelmed.

    ‘No Regrets’

    “You got to be up for it, you got to love it and just know whatever happens it’s fine but you just want to finish the day with no regrets,” Cummins said.

    And while he accepted the dimensions of Sunday’s match would be different to any his side had experienced before, Cummins said: “We play over here in India a lot so the noise is not something new. 

    “I think on this scale it’s probably bigger than we would have experienced before but it’s not something totally foreign to what we’ve had before.

    “Everyone deals with it slightly differently — you see Davey (Warner) probably dancing and winning the crowd over, other guys just staying in their own bubble –- it should be good.”

    Victory on Sunday would cap a remarkable 2023 for Australia that saw them narrowly lose a Test series in India before defeating India in a World Test Championship final in England, where they also went on to retain the Ashes after a drawn series.

    “It’s been a huge year,” said Cummins. “These are four marquee events. If you have one of those in an off-season, it’s a big off-season.

    “Some of the guys probably spent less than a couple of weeks in their own bed since the end of the Aussie summer,” added Cummins, also the skipper of Australia’s Test team.

    “The guys have been awesome. They’re so up for every game they play. 

    “To put ourselves in this position, it (winning the World Cup) would just top off an incredible year and probably a career-defining year that a lot of us will look back on in years to come and be pretty proud of.”

  • ‘When you have your crowd then you get the support’: Saud Shakeel

    ‘When you have your crowd then you get the support’: Saud Shakeel

    Pakistan paid a heavy price for being “under extra pressure” in their World Cup defeat by arch-rivals India, said batsman Saud Shakeel, who Wednesday lamented the absence of the team’s passionate supporters from the tournament.

    Pakistan were thrashed by seven wickets on Saturday at Ahmedabad’s 132,000-capacity stadium where there was only a handful of Pakistani supporters.

    Babar Azam’s team slumped from a solid 155-2 in the 30th over to be dismissed for a paltry 191.

    “I think we were under extra pressure so we tried to get out of that and wanted to play shots,” Shakeel told AFP on Wednesday.

    The smattering of Pakistani fans at the game were expatriates from the United Kingdon and United States.

    Supporters from across the border are effectively banned after a failure to gain visas.

    The Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) on Wednesday lodged an official complaint with the world governing body over the visa delays which have also kept many members of the country’s media at home.

    The PCB also complained over what they described as the “inappropriate behaviour” of Indian fans towards the Pakistan squad at the Ahmedabad game.

    “When you have your crowd then you get the support. We did not get that and it was not in our hands,” added Shakeel.

    Despite an eighth loss in eight World Cup meetings with their arch-rivals, Pakistan are still well-placed in the tournament after wins over the Netherlands and Sri Lanka.

    Middle-order batsman Shakeel scored 68 against the Netherlands before making 31 in the game with Sri Lanka. He was out for just six against India.

    Next up for Pakistan is another high-profile duel, this time with five-time champions Australia in Bengaluru on Friday.

    “The mistakes we committed in the last game, we must overcome them. That match is gone. If we win against Australia then our position will get better,” added Shakeel.

    “Australia are always good in the World Cup. They are a very good side. We know our strong areas and we must play good cricket.”

    “We had a good start to the tournament with two wins. We want to go match by match and not commit the mistakes we did against India.”

    On Wednesday, all the Pakistan players with the exception of Mohammad Haris trained in Bengaluru.

    Haris is still suffering from a fever which laid low many of the squad when they arrived from Ahmedabad.

    Star fast bowler Shaheen Shah Afridi and opener Abdullah Shafique were the worst hit but were present in the nets at the Chinnaswamy Stadium.

  • Iphones lost, bags stolen at Narendra Modi Stadium during Pakistan-India match

    The Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad witnessed a high-octane World Cup clash between arch-rivals India and Pakistan on Saturday. The world’s biggest cricket stadium was filled to capacity as more than one lakh spectators came to watch the most anticipated match of the year.

    But while the majority of the fans got what they wished for and went back home with smiles on their faces after India’s resounding victory, a section of the crowd was left wondering who stole their mobile phones.

    Bollywood actress Urvashi Rutela couldn’t see Naseem Shah bowl due to his recent injury and unfortunately lost her phone during the match too.

    “Lost my 24 carat real gold i phone at Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad! If anyone comes across it, please help. Contact me ASAP! Tag someone who can help,” Urvashi tweeted on Sunday.

    A video by Indian sports journalist Vikrant Gupta is currently going viral on social media, wherein he disclosed incidents of mobile phone and purse thefts during the Pakistan-India match in Ahmedabad.

    Gupta stated, “While entering the ground, my friend’s mobile phone was stolen from his pocket, and several other spectators also reported incidents of mobile and purse theft.” Criticizing security officials, he highlighted the possibility of mismanagement and security issues in handling such a massive crowd. He emphasized that thefts taking place in the ground surpass the concerns of mismanagement and security glitches.

    Many other people lost their phones that day.

    Meanwhile, there was one fan who even got his iPhone back as a security guard managed to catch the thief.

    Another X user, @tricatrio also lost her phone. She wrote, “Lost my iphone 15 at Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad!”

    User @shizmaite wrote, “Chaos at the gates & no one to handle the crowd. A good day ended on a bad note! #indvpak”

  • Indian travel ad degrading Pakistani cricket fans faces criticism, backlash

    Indian travel ad degrading Pakistani cricket fans faces criticism, backlash

    The most-anticipated match of the ICC Men’s Cricket World Cup is being played on Saturday.

    Billions of cricket fans from around the world will tune in to watch great rivals, Pakistan and India, play at the biggest cricket stadium, the Narendra Modi Stadium.

    The contest will mark the first instance of Pakistan and India playing a One-Day International against each other on Indian soil after 10 years. Their last bilateral meeting resulted in Pakistan defeating the hosts 2-1.

    In these exciting times, Make My Trip, an Indian travel company, has launched a newspaper ad campaign, mocking Pakistani cricket fans by promising discounts if Pakistan loses the match.

    Indian cricketer Virender Sehwag took to X (former Twitter) and wrote, “Na Ishq mein na Pyaar mein. Jo mazza hai Pakistan ki haar mein.”

    But let’s be honest here, the ad, published in Bangalore Times, Ahmedabad Times and other newspapers, would’ve made sense if the Modi Government had issued visas to Pakistani fans.

    Senior editor of CNN News 18, Pallavi Ghosh, believes that the ad is violating sporting spirit.

    Another X user, Rahul Fernandes, says that this ad doesn’t represent Indian values.

    Sumit also criticizes the campaign by saying, “We are terrible people. First, we deny them visas and then this.”

    It is pertinent to mention that Pakistani journalists got their visas on October 12 and 13, facing unexplained delays by the Indian government, and were not allowed to be in the media box throughout the World Cup.

  • Gujarat man loses 10 kgs in three months to commit burglary

    Gujarat man loses 10 kgs in three months to commit burglary

    Moti Singh Chauhan from Ahmedabad shed 10 kg for a very special reason and that is to commit a burglary, reports News 18.

    During police interrogation, he revealed that he ate only once a day for three months continuously, which enabled him to slim down and slide through a ventilator.

    According to the news outlet, two years ago, 34-year-old Singh was working at the house in Bhopal. He had gathered information about where the valuables were kept and he was also aware of the location of cameras.

    His former employers told the police that he would skip his dinner often.

    The local police found him in the footage of a Closed-Circuit Television (CCTV) camera of a hardware shop where he had gone to buy a trowel and a saw to cut the glass of the kitchen window to get inside the house.

    He managed to steal INR 37 lakh from the house on November 5, the police said.

  • $1.6 billion: IPL gets two new big-budget teams, Lucknow and Ahmedabad

    $1.6 billion: IPL gets two new big-budget teams, Lucknow and Ahmedabad

    Two corporate giants of India, RP Sanjiv Goenka Group (RPSG) and CVC Capital Partners (Irelia Company Pte Ltd) have bid a staggering sum of money, running over USD 1.6 billion, to buy the two new IPL franchises, reported ESPN Cricinfo.

    On Monday, at a walk-in bidding event in Dubai, RPSG paid INR 7,090 crore (USD 940 million approx) to buy the Lucknow franchise while CVC, a private equity fund, bought the Ahmedabad franchise for INR 5,625 crore (USD 750 million approx).

    As per details, the RPSG bid was about 250% more than the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI’s) base price of INR 2,000 crore (USD 270 million approx). The corresponding figure for CVC was over 160%. In all, 22 companies had purchased the tender document but only nine were eventually present at the walk-in bid event held in Dubai that lasted over six hours on Monday.

    The bids, enclosed in a sealed envelope, were opened after a lengthy technical evaluation process. The entire process was overseen by the IPL governing council as well as the BCCI top brass led by board president Sourav Ganguly, secretary Jay Shah, treasurer Arun Dhumal, vice-president Rajeev Shukla and joint-secretary Jayesh George.

    In a BCCI media release on Monday, Ganguly said it was “heartening” to see two new teams being added to the IPL roster “at such a high valuation, and it reiterates the cricketing and financial strength of our cricket ecosystem”. Brijesh Patel, the IPL Governing Council chairman said the IPL was “globalising” cricket and its importance as being one of the “most sought-after” leagues in sport was established through the bids from “different parts of the world and from parties with diverse portfolios”.

    The new franchises will need to pay out the entire amount over a 10-year period. To ensure that the owners have a solid foundation, the BCCI had put stringent norms in the bid document. A bidder needed to have a turnover of at least INR 3,000 crore per year for a minimum of the last three years. Measured in terms of net asset value (assets minus liability) this number was pegged at INR 2,500 crore per year over the last three years. In the case of a consortium, the BCCI had put a cap on the number of investors totaling to not more than three.

    Apart from Ahmedabad and Lucknow, the cities shortlisted by the IPL in the bid document were Cuttack, Dharamsala, Guwahati and Indore. Bidders were permitted to pick more than one city but would get the rights to own just one franchise.

    Along with Lucknow, RPSG also put in bids for Ahmedabad and Indore. While it put the same price (INR 7,090 crore) for Lucknow and Ahmedabad, it bid INR 4,790 crore for Indore.

    CVC picked Ahmedabad and Lucknow and its bid for the latter was INR 5,166 crore. Significantly, the minimum bid price raised by all nine bidders was over INR 4,000 crore.

    It is understood that the BCCI wanted to allot the winner for each city keeping in mind the highest possible bid combination and hence RPSG got Lucknow and CVC Ahmedabad. If RPSG were allotted Ahmedabad, then the BCCI would have lost over INR 400 crore on Lucknow. In contrast, in 2008 when the IPL started, the BCCI had allowed the bidders to pick their city of choice.

    The winners aside, among the bidders to eventually put their hat in the ring were Lancer Capital, who own Manchester United football club, Ahmedabad-based Indian infrastructure biggie Adani Group, Torrent Pharma, Kotak Group, All Cargo Logistics, Capri Global, and Hindustan Media Ventures Limited.

    The Adani Group was the third-highest bidder among the final nine, listing the same bid price – INR 5,100 crore – for both Ahmedabad and Lucknow.

    This is the second stint in the IPL for RPSG, who earlier ran the Pune-based Rising Pune Supergiant(s) in 2016 and 2017, when Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals served a two-year suspension in the aftermath of the 2013 IPL corruption scandal.

    A documented sports lover, Goenka wore his emotions on the sleeve the last time around, even replacing MS Dhoni as captain ahead of the 2017 season after they had finished runners-up in 2016. RPSG, which calls itself a “diversified business conglomerate”, also has wider interests in sport. They own Atletico Mohun Bagan in the Indian Super League and have owned teams in table tennis and boxing previously.

    CVC, meanwhile, are an international conglomerate with offices throughout Europe, Asia and the Americas. They were the one of the – if not the – first private equity firms to invest heavily in sport. They had a controlling stake and ran Formula 1 for close to a decade until 2016, before selling it to Liberty Media, the current owners of Formula 1. Recently they took a minority stake in La Liga, the top-flight Spanish football league, and also have vast experience in rugby leagues globally.

    The IPL, though, will be the first time CVC run a team as opposed to their traditional strength of investing in and running a sporting league. It is learned that this is the second time CVC were looking to run a team in the IPL, having failed to acquire a stake in the Delhi franchise in 2018, which went to Jindal South West (JSW).

    CVC’s Ahmedabad home will be the world’s largest cricket stadium, the Narendra Modi Stadium, which has an advertised capacity of 132,000 people. Lucknow’s home games will be at the Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Cricket Stadium.