Kolkata: Finally, East Bengal relented on Friday to abandon their position on different pricing of tickets for their fans and Mohun Bagan supporters for the forthcoming ISL derby at the Salt Lake Stadium on Sunday. Bagan officials had called for a boycott of the derby after East Bengal, who are the home team for this derby, kept a higher price for the seats in the stands meant for ‘away’ fans.
That effectively meant, Bagan fans were required to pay around Rs 100 more than the East Bengal supporters for the same seat.
However, on Friday, Emami East Bengal’s director Sandeep Agarwal announced through an official statement that uniform pricing will be implemented. “We hereby announce that any discrepancies for the the derby match on March 10 will be corrected with immediate effect,” he said in the statement. “Going forward, uniform pricing will be implemented for all attendees.”
Agarwal indicated that the state’s sports minister Aroop Biswas too had a role in this decision.
Bagan club secretary Debashis Dutta, in a statement on Thursday, had called the different pricing “shameful” and had called for an official boycott of the derby. “We unequivocally condemn the unsportsmanlike behaviour of East Bengal and have decided that we will neither buy nor sell any tickets of the derby match… This communication may be treated as an official boycott call of the upcoming derby from our side,” Dutta had stated.
Agarwal, while justifying the decision to price the tickets differently, said that such disparities are quite common throughout the world. In fact, he noted to Mohun Bagan had done a similar thing in their ISL home derby on Feb 3. “They had offered discounts to their devoted fans. In line with promoting transparency, we also introduced a discount structure on our ticket prices,” he said.
Although the the issue has been diffused for the time being, the last may not have been heard on differential ticket pricing.