Regional television network Sun TV on Thursday won an auction to buy the Indian Premier League team based in Hyderabad after the cash-strapped Deccan Chronicle group was forced to sell. Sun TV, owned by the Chennai-based Maran group, put in the highest bid of $15.9 million a year for the rights to the franchise in the lucrative Twenty20 league that was founded in 2008.
"The IPL Governing Council met earlier today in Mumbai to open the bids for a new IPL franchise," the Board of Control for Cricket in India said in a statement. "Sun TV network have won the Hyderabad franchise for an amount of 850.50 million rupees ($15.9 million) per year." It was not known whether Sun TV will retain the team's previous name of the Deccan Chargers. The Deccan Chronicle media group, which bought the Chargers before the inaugural IPL season, was thrown out of the league due to financial violations including failure to pay players' salaries.