This Article is From Mar 28, 2011

India vs Pak: VIPs welcome, others keep out

Mohali: Outside the Mohali stadium, a young woman desperate for a ticket to Wednesday's big game tries desperately to find a scalper.

"If I could find a ticket, I'd buy it for black market rates," she says, hoping she'll be overheard by someone who's looking to make a quick and big buck.

Nothing.

While regular cricket fans will get no closer to the game than their TV sets, VIPs will find doors opening for them, no password or secret handshake required.

At the stadium, a section reserved for VVIPs will welcome the most important of the important without tickets - all they need to flash is a letter of invitation from Punjab Cricket Association (PCA).

In fact, the poverty of tickets means that the 5000 visas sanctioned by India for cricket fans from across the border will go largely unused.

Of the 30,000 seats in the stadium, 16,000 were made available to the public, with 1000 tickets being released online. The tickets were all sold out within two days from its designated outlets and bank branches.

The rest were distributed to the International Cricket Council (ICC) and state cricket associations, who have distributed them to famous last names and PWMs (People Who Matter).

Also, as many a disappointed cricket fan will point out, many of the 16,000 aam admi seats ended up with black marketers.

Meanwhile, the Chandigarh airport has received 46 requests for permission to land private aircraft for the match. Most planes will not be allowed to park at Chandigarh, they'll have to fly back to Delhi or wait at Amritsar or Dehradun. It's a hard-knock life.
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