Daily Times

Sir: The fans of PSL are worried because all the tickets of PSL final have already been sold out within hour.

The people who acquired tickets of Rs.1,000 for General Enclosure now offering these tickets for Rs.5,000 on black rates. That is very expensive Sports presenter Osama Ashaqeen corroborated the sale of PSL final tickets at double rates of original prices in the black market. “People are selling tickets of Rs.4000 at Rs.8,000/-. It is not fair for genuine cricket fans. They might miss out a live cricket action because of these artificially inflated prices,”. No doubt, we cannot prove responsible for this worse situation to the Government Agencies or any other controller, as the problem is natural. The limited seats in the stadiumcannot meet the requirement of a city having population of more than 20 million.

By quoting the situation, my purpose is not to criticize, rather to focus on route cause of this overwhelming situation.In my opinion, this extraordinary passion of cricket fans is due to very rare and limited opportunities of watching live cricket actions in Pakistan and especially in Karachi.

We may discuss about some realities and analyse in following two business viewpoints:

a) Marketing

b) Best utilisation of Land and Building

For any business, marketing is the main requirement to start earning and secondly we utilize land and buildings for best earning prospects. Hence there are a lot of other business tools, but in order to keep it short, I only analyze the subject discussion in view point of Marketingand best utilization of land and building.

Does this uncontrollable demand of match tickets, not proving a ready market demand? Is there no anybody in private or government level to offer a right product to the cricket fans? Guess, if any organization, with a business point view arrange and provide opportunities time to time for watching live crickets, it will definitely be a profitable activity not only by selling the tickets, but also for earning commercials and advertisements. It will be helpful for our business community who is already facing the political as well as law and order problems of country for their business activities.

And on the other hand, if we look a huge Stadium of Karachi, which have occupied a large piece of land, have very rare occasions of matches, we may see a dark silence of this international ground which have not only occupied a rich piece of land but also a large amount of expenditure incurred each year for maintenance. It is amazing, the no activities are being arranged in Karachi Stadium, hence we may guess with the current PSL matches, about the public demand.

I finally conclude, the concerned authorities should think about it and should plan something to meet the public demand. Not only to fulfill the need of cricket fans, but also with a view of business.

Shiza Waheed

Via Email

Published in Daily Times, March 24^th 2018.