Tragedy strikes twice to leave WorldTel on the edge

Control of the shop passes, perhaps pro tem, to Mascarenhas’s sister Jean Verghese, a Director at WorldTel, Bangalore. However, what will be worrying to Verghese — and her staff — is the realisation that WorldTel has all its eggs in one basket, which will begin emptying out in three or four years’ time when Tendulkar hangs up his bat. What is needed is another radical ploy, an outlandish idea, but there simply isn’t anyone of that calibre anymore.

WorldTel wasn’t always a one-horse show; indeed, it’s a story where controversy and charisma go hand in hand. Tendulkar’s trip to millionairedom, WorldTel’s consequent rise and rise, the television rights scam during the 1996 World Cup involving Mascarenhas and Jagmohan Dalmiya, the match-fixing controversy which led to WorldTel’s Bangalore offices being raided…A large slice of contemporary Indian cricket history.

WorldTel’s existence prior to 1995 was nothing to write home about. Though WorldTel was set up in 1989, it shot to fame six years later with the first Tendulkar contract, worth Rs 35 crore over five years. It was a paradigm shift in Indian sport, as breathtaking in its audacity — cricketers simply didn’t make that kind of money then — as in its simplicity. From there to the next contract, five years later, for Rs 100 crore, was just a geometric progression. As a former WorldTel employee reminisced today, ‘‘What stood Mark apart was his risk-taking ability. When he came in, there was no system of marketing sportspersons in Indian sport. Stars like Kapil Dev and Sunil Gavaskar were never marketed despite the potential. He came in with a single-point agenda — to revolutionise the way Indian sport was marketed. Mark was a man in a hurry. Everything was planned and implemented in a flash. He was completely open to ideas. And he wanted to jump in where no one had jumped before.’’

Backed by a young, talented team, he jumped. Some of the ideas didn’t work. Cricket Talk, the much-publicised glossy magazine, folded up less than a year. Mark didn’t bother, neither did WorldTel.

Another venture was a partnership with Mick Jagger to bring live cricket to the Internet, but the dotcom bust took care of that.

When match-fixing rocked the Indian cricket establishment, Mascarenhas sat pretty; others may have fallen, and Mascarenhas himself was implicated but, crucially, nobody named Tendulkar. Indeed, he was probably the only really big contemporary name in Indian cricket to come out unblemished. Gradually, the charges against WorldTel also died away. If Mascarenhas has been described by friends (though he probably had more enemies than friends) as ‘‘fiercely ambitious’’, Singh was no different. Though he was at the helm for just over a year, with Tendulkar secure in the bag there wasn’t much to do beyond steadying the ship. However, colleagues say Samir was almost as brilliant as Mark, if comparitively less adventurous. For years, WorldTel has pushed the envelope of Indian sports marketing. It’s been a roller-coaster ride. Now, the wheels look like in danger of coming off.