Indian Bloggers League - The Phenomenon

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It was a lazy Monday evening on the 11th of June, my good friend Deepak Karthik of Whatever It Takes fame came up with an ingenious idea to host a IPL-like tournament involving the Blogging community called the Indian Bloggers League. When I saw his post on the IndiBlogger Family group, I immediately lapped onto it. We both started discussing the pros and cons about a tournament of this magnitude. I was eager to participate but Deepak insisted I work behind the scenes to organize the tournament with him, and so I got on board to be a part of the organizing committee of IBL and also as a moderator.

We didn’t know what to expect at that point but promptly created ‘another’ blog group on Facebook to annoy people with tons of notifications. We added few of our blog friends to the group, in the meanwhile me and Deepak were also brainstorming on chat about the format, rules, the number of teams etc. The idea was still very sketchy at this point. We posted whatever little we discussed about the tournament on the group waiting for the response from our fellow bloggers. An hour after the group was created, the group was unusually quiet, and there wasn’t much response. Deepak pinged me on chat, “Bro no response yet”. I replied, “Just give it a couple of days bro”. I was so wrong, should’ve said “a couple of hours” instead. What transpired in the next couple of hours was unprecedented; we were not ready for it. Within 3 hours of the group creation, there were already 200 members. The response was overwhelming; we hadn’t even decided how many teams we should allow participating or how many members in a team or things like that but already there were people forming teams for their respective cities. I was introduced to my fellow team members in the organizing committee by Deepak. Saravana Kumar Murugan of Few Miles fame and Binoy Karan of WriteUp Café joined us. The four of us took some time off from the chaos that was happening on the group to come up with some concrete set of rules and regulations for the IBL. Our brainstorming sessions lasted well into the night which continued in the succeeding days. And within a day, we had come up with some neat set of rules, a proper format, created a Fan Page, Twitter account, a Blog with a custom domain (thanks to Binoy for his self-less act of buying the server space for the sake of IBL from his own pocket). Also, we finalized the scheduling of the tournament in the coming days.

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Even though the tournament is yet to begin, we have already had our share of arguments, fights and difference of opinions. But we have stuck it out through it all and held ourselves together to work as a cohesive unit. This little ordeal has also brought all four of us much closer to each other, even though we have never met one another.

The greatest impact of IBL is, it has taken the conversations between bloggers to a much more personal level, and we all converse with each other as if we have known one another since the past many years. Earlier, conversations between bloggers may have been limited to the comment sections of each other’s blogs, but the advent of the IndiBlogger Family and IBL groups on Facebook has paved way for an interactive era for bloggers which was unheard of before. I am very happy to have played a small part in that transformation.

We, at IBL aim to promote the art of writing and the art of blogging and of course the competitive spirit. It will be a great test to all the teams to work as a team, gel together as one unit, to help win this prestigious tournament playing for their respective cities.

So who will take home the crown as the Champions of the Inaugural Edition of the Indian Bloggers League?

Will it be the cultural capital of Maharashtra known as the Pune Blog-In blowing their trumpets proudly in the end?

Armed with Dhoklas, Theplas and Phapdas, will it be one of the most hard working teams of the tournament, The Amdavadi Thadka?

Bombay’s Bloggywood - The superstars from the city of Bollywood are among the favorites to go all the way.

Maybe the best team on paper known as Bengaluru Bloggers’ Bistro from the Garden City of India which boasts of some of the best bloggers in the country in their respective genres. Who can bet against them?

The dark horses of the tournament from the land of the Chanakyas and the Aryabhattas – The Patliputra Wordsmiths have the potential to go all the way.

Known for their competitive and sporting nature, will the team from Chennai be able to emulate the exploits of their more successful counterpart of the IPL? The Chennai Super Bloggers are a team to watch out for.

The Kolkata Knight Writers team swears by the notion, pen is mightier than the sword; they are a bunch of talented writers whom no one can underestimate.

The spirited and enthusiastic bunch of bloggers from the Capital city of India – The Delhi Sutras are exceptionally talented. They may not be the most favored team but they are the team to beat.

The Battle of Blogs begins on the 1st of July. Be sure to catch all the action of this unprecedented blogging extravaganza on our Website, on our WriteUp Café Page, our Facebook Page and our Facebook Group.

136 Bloggers. 8 Teams. 4 Grueling Rounds spread over 3 Months. One Ultimate Winner. The phenomenon that is the Indian Bloggers League has arrived.