Parveen Batish: Indian Panthers CEO on the team's ban from the NBL

An unshakable insistence from Indian Panthers boss Parveen Batish that their indefinite ban from the National Basketball League won't be permanent. 

The first year team were handed an immediate ban mid-season following serious allegations of payment issues and player unrest. 

The Panthers can return to the NBL if they meet various conditions set by the league's commission. 

When asked if has been asked if their catalogue of off court issues have been sorted, Batish told Mike Hosking they’re 100% sorted. 

He says when they come back they’re going to be much stronger, as the positivity around what they can do and deliver is enormous. 

Newstalk ZB understands the other 11 NBL teams were unanimous in revoking the Panthers league license. 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
How about this. We had our business with the basketball
So the New Zealand Basketball League suspended the Indian Panthers
for the rest of the season. They were an expansion side.
They ran into all sorts of allegations and problems. The
CEO of the team is Pavin Batish, who is will
us a very good morning to you.

Speaker 2 (00:14):
Good morning, Mike, I sort of.

Speaker 1 (00:16):
I don't even know where to start. How can it's
all gone so wrong?

Speaker 2 (00:21):
Look, let me start like just saying, you know, give
a big apology to the basketball community, to you know,
the Commission, the league and in fact the other clubs,
because everyone's been really supportive over the period of time.
We've only been going for about eight weeks and it's
been a difficult time. We've made them, we've made some mistakes,
and you know, a good thing about what's happened is that,

(00:42):
you know, the Commission has given us the opportunity to
rectify some of those things that we've that we've missed on,
and you know what we need to do is we
need to get back to the philosophy, the original philosophy
of what we were about, which is about developing Indian players,
Indian basketball players, giving them the opportunity to play in
a mature league like the you know, the New Zealand

(01:04):
MBL and play against good players. And that's what we
need to get back to. And then what will happen
as a result of that is that, you know, the
community ties will naturally happen because you know, as we
saw in Palmerston, there is a there is a you know,
a real opportunity with local communities where our players and

(01:25):
the Palmerston players were invited to an Indian gurudwara for
dinner and embraced and there was cultural activity at halftime.
Those are the things that we can bring, but they're
almost like a secondary thing that we need to do.
And what went wrong is that we didn't stick to
our philosophy of what we should have done, and we
made in the stakes, be it a financial or whatever.

(01:47):
But we've been given the opportunity to fix loads.

Speaker 1 (01:49):
When you do, will you be back? And when you
are back, is it sorted once and for all one.

Speaker 2 (01:56):
When we come back, we're going to be much stronger
because the pot the positivity around what we can do
and what we can deliver is enormous. The opportunities that
we have are enormous and that's what we need to
deliver on. So those mistakes, you know that the best
thing you can do, as I'm sure some philosopher said,
is learn from your mistake, put those correct and move forward.

(02:18):
And that's what we intend to do. I know.

Speaker 1 (02:19):
All I can do is wish you the very best
with it. Pavin Bettish strange story, though, wasn't it for
the way. It's one of those stories that came out
of nowhere and he thought, what the hell was going
on there? For more from the Mic Asking Breakfast, listen
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