ITC resumes service

BIZSPORT

Mahesh Bhupathi and Leander Paes put India on the international tennis map with numerous Grand Slam titles and their exploits in the Davis Cup competition.

But now Bhupathi, founder of the sports management company Globosport, may have done Indian sport another service by playing a role in the comeback of ITC, once the biggest patron of sport in India.

Bhupathi has roped in ITC Foods to sponsor South Asia's biggest women's tennis event, which is part of the global Women's Tennis Association (WTA) circuit.

ITC's support to sport usually went beyond cricket. The company backed India's oldest professional golf tournament, the Indian Open, which went by the name of Wills Indian Open and then the Classic Indian Open. It also backed the Indian pro golf tour, Wills Sport Tour.

But the global focus on tobacco sponsorhip meant ITC was bound to come under the scanner. It began with many states banning sponsorships by tobacco firms. Slowly, ITC and all its sponsorships were smoked out of the market.

When ITC went off the radar, it was backing the the $300,000 Indian Open golf tournament through its subsidiary, Wills Sport. It also sponsored the $400,000 Indian Open tennis championship and the $750,000 World doubles tennis championship through its division, Gold Flake Expressions Greeting Cards.

Of course, ITC's biggest involement was with cricket, where it spent Rs 30-35 lakh per Test and one-dayer. In most years India plays around 35-40 one-dayers and about 10 Test matches.

ITC also backed domestic cricket, and that was the hardest hit, though the main national team did find backing from companies like Sahara.

The other sport to have been hit hard was golf, which was on the upswing. ITC's withdrawal put it a step back, though Hero Honda's intervention helped stop that slide.

Over the years, ITC did see the ban coming. It entered the lifestyle retailing business with the Wills Sport range of international quality relaxed wear for men and women in 2000.

The Wills Lifestyle chain of exclusive stores later expanded its range to include Wills Classic formal wear (2002) and Wills Clublife evening wear (2003). It also made a foray into the popular segment with its men's wear brand, John Players, in 2002, and expanded into areas like technology and kitchen stuff.

ITC Foods came into being around 2001-2002 and is expanding at an incredible rate. And it is under the ITC Foods's brand, Sunfeast, that it has come back into tennis. Sunfeast is clearly an attempt to severe all links with cigarette brands.

According to Bhupathi, the first-ever "WTA Sunfeast Open 2005" will feature some of the world's leading players as well as the new generation of Indian stars led by Sania Mirza and Shikha Uberoi. The event will be played at Kolkata's Netaji Indoor Stadium from September 19-25 with prize money of $170,000.

In some sense, ITC's comeback and WTA event's organisation is appropriate. The ITC is based in Kolkata and some of India's tennis greats "" Naresh Kumar, Premjit Lall, Jaidip Mukherjea and, of course, Leander Paes ""hail from the Eastern metropolis.

While Bhupathi's titles may have brought great joy to tennis fans, ITC's return could mean a lot for Indian sport that barring cricket, has always struggled for corporate support.