Kabaddi Champions League Expands: 8 to 10 Teams, Rs 5 Crore Auction Purse per Franchise

The Kabaddi Champions League, played in Haryana, is entering its next season with a significant expansion. The number of franchises has been raised from 8 to 10, and each team has been given a Rs 5 crore auction purse to build its squad. This amount is the total squad-spending budget for buying players, not prize money. At prevailing rates, Rs 5 crore is roughly US$600,000 — only a fraction of a single Pro Kabaddi League franchise's typical auction outlay. On the numbers, then, the expansion announcement may look big, but the league's financial scale remains small and semi-professional. At the auction, the highest bid was for Ayan Lochab at Rs 17.4 lakh. Sunil Malik, described as India's Asian Games captain, went for just Rs 10 lakh. On one side, the league's most expensive player costs Rs 17.4 lakh; on the other, a claimed national-team captain settles at Rs 10 lakh. That gap raises questions in itself. It is possible the Asian Games captain label is dated, or belongs to a different edition and a different style of the sport, or that the market simply is not pricing international pedigree. Without independent confirmation, the claim cannot be treated as settled fact. The report names five players but gives no performance data — no raid points, tackle points or success rates — so player quality cannot be assessed. Only market prices are observable. The league's trials drew around 6,400 registrations, with more than 300 players making it into the auction pool. The selection funnel is therefore wide, and talent is coming through from the grassroots. But reading that figure as evidence of the league's popularity would be a mistake. The 6,400 registrations show how few sporting opportunities exist in rural areas and how far young people will travel in search of them. This is a supply-side number — a crowd of players, not of spectators. The league's ten franchises are based in Bhiwani, Rohtak, Karnal, Gurugram, Sonipat, Panipat, Faridabad, Hisar, Jhajjar and Kurukshetra. All ten are within Haryana. The name Champions League may suggest a national or international scale, but in reality this is a regional competition. Haryana is regarded as India's traditional wrestling and kabaddi heartland, where players emerging from village akhadas reach the national team. The league has no meaningful presence in Maharashtra, Punjab or southern India, so calling it a national-level competition would be premature. On the rules, the report offers nothing — no mention of Standard Style or Circle Style, no foreign-player quota, no squad size. These are not small details, because if different rules apply, the Rs 5 crore purse is buying a fundamentally different product. Technically, this is a developmental, semi-professional tournament, not a direct rival to the Pro Kabaddi League. A Rs 5 crore purse, if it is per franchise, sits around the floor of PKL spending. Player prices follow the same ratio — a top price of Rs 17.4 lakh, against Rs 1 crore-plus bids that are routine for star raiders in PKL. For now, therefore, this league is a platform for players who could not reach PKL, not an attempt to pull PKL stars away. The most important part of this story is the part that is not in the headline. According to the report, PKL's 13th season could slip to June-July 2027, because the league currently has no new broadcast-rights partner. In other words, the tournament on which Indian kabaddi's entire professional structure rests is itself in uncertainty. Against that backdrop, the Champions League's expansion signals not organic strength but an attempt to fill a vacuum. The Champions League name appears borrowed from football's UEFA branding — it signals ambition, but does not change the real scale. PKL stalling and a regional league running are two sides of the same coin. If PKL stays shut for long, thousands of players will have no professional stage and will turn to regional leagues. The Champions League is trying to fill that gap, but its reach is limited and it cannot replace PKL. Conversely, if PKL returns by mid-2027, the Champions League will revert to feeder status, and this expansion may prove to be a one-season experiment. Several governance questions remain unanswered. It is not clear whether the league is sanctioned by the Amateur Kabaddi Federation of India or the International Kabaddi Federation. If it is not sanctioned, players could face complications in national-team selection. The report also says nothing about player contract terms, anti-doping testing or refereeing standards. Such gaps are common in early-stage leagues, but when a league styles itself a Champions League, those questions need answers. No hard commercial data is available. There is no word of broadcast rights being sold, no sponsorship, no ticket sales and no attendance figures. In that situation, going from 8 to 10 teams and raising the purse to Rs 5 crore, without any evidence of revenue, looks like an aggressive bet. It has been common in early Indian leagues for franchise owners or a promoter to fund the league themselves. Until media rights and sponsorship emerge, it would be better to hold off on calling the expansion an achievement. From a player-earnings perspective, this league is still limited support. The top price is Rs 17.4 lakh and leading players are going for Rs 10 lakh. Most players will clearly remain part-time, running their careers alongside government jobs or other work — a familiar pattern in Haryana's rural sports economy. The league is giving a village-produced player a contract, but not yet a dependable livelihood. An attached also-read section mentions plans for a World Cup and a women's league, but gives no detail. Those references belong to separate stories and should not be counted as achievements of this league. No international dimension for the league has emerged so far. At the top of the risk list is PKL's broadcast crisis, because it affects the entire ecosystem. Next is the question of the league's sanctioning and player eligibility. The third risk is that expansion without broadcast or revenue gets read as progress, when it may simply be growth on paper. Fourth, the Champions League name may lead readers to overstate its status. Three things should be watched in the coming months — PKL's new media-rights deal, the Champions League's federation sanctioning, and any broadcast or sponsorship agreement for the league. If all three become clear, this league could become a genuine development rung in Indian kabaddi. If not, the ten-team expansion will remain a seasonal experiment. The figures in this report rest on a media statement and have not been independently verified; confidence in all factual claims should therefore be capped at medium.