The West Indies cricket team celebrates after beating England in the ICCWorld T20 final match at Eden Garden in Kolkata, India, on April 3, 2016./Photo = AFP=Yonhap News

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By Rinmi Yangya, India student correspondent, Asia Today = Debates and discussions on 'Indian Premier League(IPL) of a professional Twenty20 cricket or Life" are at its peak.

Questioning if people aren't more important than IPL, Bombay High Court on April 7 said, "People don't get water in Maharashtra for three to four days. This (water for maintaining cricket pitch) is a criminal waste," suggesting shifting IPL matches (20 matches) to be played in Maharashtra to other States to prevent further water shortage. 

The court further stated that drinking water is a priority in accordance with the state water policy. Also the Chief Minister, Devendra Fadnavis on the 8th said he has no problem even if IPL matches are moved out of Maharashtra.  

Bombay High Court, Mumbai (Bombay), Maharashtra.

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While on the other side of coin, neither drought nor poverty is new to Maharashtra. And IPL seems more like a sacrificial lamb. Fewer or no matches in Maharashtra wouldn't solve a thing when it comes to water scarcity. If policy makers are serious about alleviating water shortages, they should first need to have a common sense checked and should have discourage sugarcane plantation.

In 2014-2015, the estimated sugar output from Maharashtra was 10 billion kilograms. Each kilogram of sugar uses 2000 liters of water, so in total to total water used for sugarcane plantation was 2 trillion liters. 60,000 liters of water to be needed every day to maintain the pitches are not even a minuscule fraction of water from sugarcane plantation in Maharashtra.

This is the reason why we can't criticize the BCCI that kicked of IPL tonight on the 8th as an egoist.