The grand opening ceremony of the Bangladesh Premier League T20 tournament will be held in Dhaka on Thursday.
President Zillur Rahman is expected to inaugurate the first edition of the competition at 6:30pm at the Sher-e-Bangla National Stadium in the city’s Mirpur.
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In the ceremony, a segment on Mother Language Day will follow performances by Indian and local silver screen stars.
Bipasha Basu, Malaika Arora Khan, Rituparna Sengupta from India and Shamim Ara Nipa, Shibli Mohammad, Shakib Khan and Apu Bishwas from Bangladesh will perform at the ceremony while singers Shaan, Bappi Lahiri also confirmed their participation along with Ayub Bacchu, Kumar Biswajit, Mila and popular band Miles.
The tournament will start Friday with matches between Barisal Burners and Sylhet Royals and Chittagong Kings taking on Duronto Rajshahi.
The competition will start with a double round robin group stage, in which each of the 6 teams will play against every other team twice followed by two semi-finals and the final.
A total of 33 matches will be held during the tournament. Of those, 25 will be held in Dhaka while the eight in Zohur Ahmed Chowdhury stadium in Chittagong.
The final is slated on February 29 in Dhaka.
