A New League on the Sports Block

THE RUGBY LEAGUE CAN TAKE A LEAF OUT OF THE IPL PLAYBOOK

- CHRISTINA MONIZ

According to the Sporting Nation report by GroupM, the sports industry, primarily driven by cricket, produced a total business of ₹16,733 crore in 2024, of which 85% belonged to cricket, while 15% belonged to emerging sports. Given that, a new league representing the game of rugby is bound to raise eyebrows.

But Rahul Bose, president of Rugby India, phoo-phoos any skepticism saying the sport is in fact widely played outside of urban areas and metros. "The playing interest in rugby so far is in 322 districts out of 760, which is about 40% of the country's districts. The profile of the average Indian rugby player is different from the average rugby fan, which will be cultivated through the Rugby Premier League (RPL)," Bose says.

Despite the apparent lack of awareness about rugby among urban audiences, he says that tickets for the first game of the inaugural league, launched by Rugby India and GMR Sports, as well as that of all the weekend games were completely sold out.