Raipur: Chhattisgarh team captain Harpreet Singh Bhatia and all-rounder Ajay Mandal have got a place in the 16th season of IPL. Harpreet was bought by Kings XI Punjab for Rs 40 lakh. Whereas, Ajay Mandal has been bought by Chennai Super Kings for a base price of Rs 20 lakh. Harpreet was earlier selected from Madhya Pradesh for Pune Warriors and Kolkata Knight Riders but Ajay Mandal is selected for the first time. Both the players were selected for the auction on the basis of their performances in the Mushtaq Ali Trophy and Vijay Hazare trophy matches.
For the first time, the names of the nine players from Chhattisgarh were shortlisted for the auction of players for the Indian Premier League. In this, the names of 19-year-old Ayush Pandey, Ranji team captain Harpreet Singh Bhatia, Shashank Singh, Amandeep Khare, Ajay Mandal, Shubham Singh, Shubham Agarwal, Ravi Kiran, Sumit Ruikar were present.
Notably, 30 players of the Ranji and Under-25 age group of the state had filled out the form in BCCI for the auction, out of which nine were shortlisted by the board. Shashank Singh has earlier played in IPL 2022 from the state. He had a hat-trick of sixes in the match between Gujarat Titans and Hyderabad Sunrisers. Both Ajay and Harpreet are expected to show some phenomenal performances in the upcoming edition of the Indian Premiere League.