Rajiv Shukla, the Chairman of the Indian Premier League governing council, has come out and reiterated that IPL has a far bigger financial windfall coming for Indian Cricket in the future and it will further strengthen BCCI's hold over the World Cricket. 

BCCI recently signed a five year deal with StarSports of $2.55-billion to broadcast 300 Indian Premier League games from 2018-22, biggest in cricket's history so far. According to BCCI, India contributes 70% of International Cricket Council's money. 

The IPL, Rajiv Shukla thinks, can be as big as the other sporting leagues like English Premier League (EPL) and America's National Basketball Association (NBA) in the future. He was recently quoted saying, "We are not able to figure out where it (broadcast rights and sponsorship) will peak... but I think after the EPL, this is the most important league. It can match any league," 

"Shukla ji", as he is fondly called has plans in place. In cities where we don't host matches, we organise fan parks where we invite people to watch the match on the big screen. So 20,000-30,000 people are coming to the fan parks, Now we are planning to take it overseas, to places like Dubai, the UK and also America."

IPL's 60 games over seven weeks earn about $8.5 million per game in television revenues, just in India. Administrators like Shukla could see the future, "The IPL works so well because it was devised as a complete marketing ecosystem, The fan following and the viewers are increasing every year. In terms of revenue, it's also doing wonderfully well, Now we are showing IPL throughout the world,"  

(Inputs from CricketNext)