Mumbai: India's richest man Mukesh Ambani has earmarked a fat budget to watch the April 2 World Cup final with family and friends at the Wankhede Stadium, the Mumbai Mirror reported on Saturday. With India one win away from the title clash, it seems like most of his business moves, he's got this investment spot on too.
Reliance Industries chairman Mukesh Ambani has splurged Rs 5 crore on three corporate boxes in MCA Pavilion at the southern end of the renovated stadium. With 15-16 seats in each box, this roughly works out to Rs 10 lakh per guest. That's around Rs 1650 for very ball bowled, assuming both teams bat 50 overs. The cheapest ticket for the World Cup final, by the way, is Rs 1500.
While the three air-conditioned corporate boxes come equipped with everything that money can buy --LCD TVs, video-matrix score cards, personal attendants and food and drinks -- even in pure cricketing terms, these seats offer the best view of the game. Placed right behind the bowler's arm or the wicket-keeper (depending which end the bowler is running in from), these are cricket buff's delight.
The stars of the show, the players themselves, are also not too far from these privileged cantilevered perchs. The players' dressing rooms are right under the MCA Pavilion.
Wankhede stadium has 57 corporate boxes on the offer this time and sources said all of them have been taken. No information, however, is availble on how much the other boxes went for.
Lalchand Rajput, secretary, Mumbai Cricket Association, confirmed the Ambanis have three corporate boxes booked. “Ambanis have bought three corporate boxes. These are some of the best seats we have to offer,” he added. A Reliance Industries spokesman refused to comment.
Wankhede stadium has a capacity of 33,000 and only 4,000 tickets were made available for the public and were sold online. The ICC decided not to sell tickets over the counter after police had trouble controlling crowds during group games in Bangalore and Nagpur.
