Tendulkar & Co back as Raipur gets ready to host Unacademy Road Safety World Series T20
Wednesday, 10 February 2021 (11:07 IST)
Mumbai: India will once again witness the legends in action as the Unacademy Road Safety World Series T20 gets underway at the Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh International Cricket Stadium in Raipur from March 2 to 21.
The first edition of the series had to be called off after four games on March 11, 2020 due to Covid-19 situation worldwide. All remaining matches will be played in newly-built 65,000 capacity stadium in Raipur and will be broadcast Live on COLORS Cineplex, COLORS Kannada Cinema, FTA channel Rishtey Cineplex and live stream on VOOT and Jio.An array of stars including Master Blaster Sachin Tendulkar, Virender Sehwag, Brian Lara, Bret Lee, Tilakratne Dilshan, Muttiah Muralitharan and many more legends of five cricket playing nations — Australia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, West Indies and host India — will be back in the field to recreate the magic of old in the annual T20 cricket tournament, organized to create awareness towards road safety in the country. As cricket is the most followed sport in the country and cricketers are looked upon as idols, this League aims to influence and change people’s mind set towards their behaviour on the roads.
The Road Safety World Series is an initiative by Road Safety Cell of Maharashtra in association with Professional Management Group (PMG) spearheaded by Little Master Sunil Gavaskar as the Commissioner of the Series and Sachin Tendulkar is the Brand Ambassador of the League. Education technology platform Unacademy is the title sponsor and Viacom18 is the broadcast partner of the league.
Glad to host the Road Safety World Series in Raipur, the Honourable Chief Minister of
Chattisgarh Bhupesh Baghel said, “It is a matter of great pride and honour to be hosting the
legends in Raipur during the Road Safety World Series, which I believe is a wonderful concept
to create awareness about the menace, and a very important one given that one person dies
every four minutes on Indian roads. I also believe that this tournament will bring smile to millions in this hour of gloom. I extend a very warm welcome to everyone in Chattisgarh.”
Founder of the Road Safety World Series, who is also a Senior Member in the Road Safety
Cell of Maharashtra and Chief of RTO Thane (Konkan Range), Ravi Gaikwad said, “The year
gone by has taught us a very important lesson, to be compassionate towards our fellowmen, if
we can show the same compassion and empathy to everyone on the road, our roads will be safer for all — walkers, cyclists, bikers, motorists et all. To spread awareness towards road safety, the Unacademy Road Safety World Series started with lot of hope and promise last year, but had to call it off due to the challenging times. But, I am extremely glad to announce that we are here again, and I am thankful to all, the players, the officials, our broadcast partners and our large work force who have come together to take the initiative forward in these difficult times. Last but not the least, my sincere thanks to the Chief Minister of Chattisgarh Bhupesh Baghel for giving us the opportunity to hold the event in this beautiful state.”
Speaking about the same, Rohan Lavsi, Head, Hindi Movies Cluster, Viacom18 said,
“Unacademy Road Safety World Series is a unique property that brings cricket and entertainment together onto the same platform. Having endured a lot of challenging times last year that not only brought our lives to a standstill, we are happy to announce the return of the league that will give cricket fans another opportunity to witness the cricketing legends play on the field. We are excited to bring the league first time on our both pay and FTA channels.”
Talking about the association, Karan Shroff, Vice President, Marketing, Unacademy said, “As
an education platform that reaches out to millions of learners from across the country, Unacademy can create a huge impact in influencing the youth to become responsible citizens. We are excited to be a part of the Unacademy Road Safety World Series that combines the passion of cricket with the message of health and safety. Both are causes that resonate deeply with us and we are extremely proud to associate with an event that shares our vision of transforming lives by creating awareness about road safety.”
PMG CEO Melroy D’Souza, said: “All of us at PMG are very excited about using cricket as a
platform to promote Road Safety awareness which is very crucial in everyone’s life. Look forward to bringing cricket to Raipur for the fans to see their legends back in action, an opportunity which I am sure all of them will cherish. The series will also provide a chance for the cricketing legends to pit their wits and skills against each other once again.”
