Sunny Bhandarkar is the face of change for basketball in India with the success of EPBL and EWPBL

Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], July 17: Sunny Bhandarkar, CEO of Elite Sports India, has been single-handedly working to revolutionise the sport of Basketball in India. Just in the last year itself, two nationwide leagues have come to life under his watchful eye, the Elite Pro Basketball League and the Elite Women’s Pro Basketball League, with thousands of basketballs players putting their names in the draw to be able to compete in these two competitive leagues. The main aim behind this relentless work is to change the conversation around the viability of playing basketball in India and to be able to give a viable career pathway to athletes.

1. Your main aim is to revolutionise the basketball landscape in India. How do you aim to do this holistically? 

India is home to many sports lovers; for the most part, cricket and football have accumulated the majority of the sports fans or even have been consumed as entertainment products in India. Basketball is a fantastic sport, whether it’s in terms of playing or viewing, and there is no need to deprive an athlete or a sports fan of a domestic professional basketball league that is their own, made in India, and played in India.

Our primary vision is to provide a dream to every athlete, the dream that makes an athlete practice harder, train harder, and make them believe that putting the extra yards into their sport can enable them to make a reputable career. We believe that everyone should be able to make a career out of their passion. Playing their favourite sport should be able to serve their daily bread & butter, and basketball has the potential to do just that.

2. There are 2 leagues currently out there under your entity, EPBL and EWPBL. Could you please talk about how these leagues have been received in the basketball community of India? 

When we started off with the concept of curating a basketball league in India, we started with 8 teams. We announced the launch and instantly saw a lot of scepticism, but the support grew stronger eventually.  As soon as we announced the league, we saw an overwhelming response that we didn’t see coming. Phones began buzzing 24×7, and our mailboxes turned into a pile of queries. The resumes & achievements of the players were so outstanding that the 8 teams wouldn’t be able to accommodate this pool of talent. This led us to double the teams from 8 to 16 in less than a year, which has never been the case in any professional league in any sport in India before.

Even for the EWPBL, we were anticipating around 100 athletes for it to be a valid entity, but when we announced the first-ever EWPBL tryouts in Delhi, we got more than 500 plus women that participated in the first round of the tryouts. Moreover, we locked in the team owners for all 6 teams within 24 hours and made sure we sped up the drive for the women’s league as well.

3. How does the general population perception stand at the moment in the country? How do you plan to change that since even today, it does not make the list of the most popular sports in India? 

I believe that Basketball is one of the most broad-based sports in India. I see almost every other school has no amenities but at least a (cemented) basketball court that’s being used to play other sports. You’ll see kids play cricket or football on these cemented Basketball courts. The reason why it’s broad-based and not popular is because there’s no real “incentive” to play the sport. Therefore, the sport, or most sports, in general, today, is viewed as an extracurricular activity, to say the least.

We need to provide them with a platform, inject a dream, and a reason to pursue it as a career. Once we establish that, automatically, we will see a lot more competition among these youngsters to get drafted and get paid more money.  I can guarantee that eventually, players will go from playing for the certificates to playing for the country’s pride to skyrocketing into the best in the country and, ultimately, the champion player in the world. Why? Because they would have a reason to do so and a platform to showcase their skills and talent.

Today, no one knows who the best player in the country is, and hardly any other player wants to overtake that guy as the best. Once that changes, the entire mindset is bound to change.

4. What’s the way forward with EPBL and EWPBL? 

Apart from the league that will be played in the latter half of this year, EPBL and EWPBL are also going to set up academies throughout India by the end of this year to scout and train the uprising talent in the country. We plan to have some of the biggest names in Basketball come and mentor these athletes. The only way forward is to cultivate the culture of playing the sport of basketball professionally and to provide the tools and a clear path for young athletes to achieve this goal.

5. Ewpbl has set you apart from other sporting leagues since few have a women-centric league. Is that something you’ll have consciously made a decision on?

Having a league for women was always a part of the plan. The only thing that we had not decided was “when?”

The overwhelming response drove us to pull the trigger even before season 1 for the men. The support that we received from the women athletes was monumental and so much so that now the women’s season will be the opener for Indian Basketball’s first-ever Pro League, even before the men’s season. We are truly excited to be a part of the change in India and believe that we will be able to revolutionize basketball to become the next big sporting property in India within no time.

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