Basketball Federation of India to organise National women’s league

05/15/2019

The Basketball Federation of India is planning to start a big-time national women’s league in India in the next few months. The federation is looking forward to involving places like Chennai, Bengaluru, Kerala, Delhi, Mumbai and Ludhiana among others in the upcoming league for the sport in India.

With the number of sports federations in the country starting their own leagues, Basketball Federation of India (BFI) is the latest body to join them. The BFI had laid out a proper plan to host women’s league in the country and according to the statement of the federation’s president K Govindaraj, the body has “bigger things in store” for the basketball players of India.

“It’s just a start and we have bigger things in store for the players,” Govindaraj told Sportstar.

“We have formed a committee, discussed the league format, the number of teams and cities to be involved, cash incentives and much more. I expect the whole thing to take shape at the earliest.”

The federation is having an eye on the Indian cities Chennai, Bengaluru, Delhi, Mumbai and Ludhiana along with one from Kerala to start with in the first edition. Govindaraj is of the belief that these places have some love for the sport and that is why the federation is looking ahead to start the event from these areas.

“There is a big attraction for basketball in these cities and so we plan to launch from there. It can be six teams in each of these cities and the top two from each city will advance to the main show,” the BFI president explained.

“It’s going to be on a trial basis this year as we need to understand a few things before going full throttle.”

When asked about sponsorship issues, Govindaraj replied, “I am not worried about that as we have philanthropists to support us. Trust me, in the next two years the sport in India will take a totally different shape.”

“We will have foreign players and it’s going to be really big. We are also simultaneously working on that.”