New Delhi: In a surprise development, the Indian cricket team's longtime sponsor Sahara India on Saturday ended financial ties with the BCCI and also pulled out of the IPL by withdrawing from Pune Warriors' ownership just hours before the players' auction.

Sahara, which has been the team sponsor for 11 years, signed a renewed agreement with the BCCI on July 1, 2010 till December 31, 2013. Sahara was paying Rs 3.34 crore per Test match, one-day international and Twenty20 International under the new terms.

"...after an 11-year journey as sponsors, we can say with surety that cricket has become very rich. Many rich people are there to support cricket with a strong will to do so. So, with absolute peace of mind we can exit from cricket under BCCI and are exiting with a heavy heart," Sahara India said in a statement. "It was an emotional decision for us to start this sponsorship but our emotions were never appreciated and many genuine situations were not given due consideration at all,"the statement read.

Sahara, which entered the cash-rich IPL bandwagon last year along with the now-disbanded Kochi Tuskers Kerala, complained that several requests put forth by it with regards to players and the number of matches were not accepted by the BCCI. "Our first entry into IPL was thwarted in 2008 when we were disqualified, owing to a small technicality on the whims and fancies of BCCI. Yet our Bid was not opened," the statement said.

"Last year, Sahara entered the IPL on the basis of information in the media and everywhere else that 94 matches will be played among 10 teams. The bid price was accordingly calculated, but only 74 matches were played. We are still pursuing continuously with the BCCI to refund the extra bid money proportionately. It has been denied on the basis of strict rules.

Sahara is apparently also unhappy with the fact that Royal Challengers Bangalore  were allowed to buy replacement player Chris Gayle this season. "The manner in which Gayle was bought was not liked by many franchises including Sahara," a Sahara official said on condition of anonymity.

Sahara said even during the Champions League Twenty20, an injury-plagued Mumbai Indians were allowed to field an extra foreign player due to the crisis in the team but such gestures were never extended to Pune Warriors. "Incidentally, once during the Champions League, one of the Indian IPL teams had a lot of injured players so they were rightly, out of natural justice, allowed to break the rules and take one extra foreign player. We appreciated this natural justice," it said.

"We really feel such one-sided emotional relationship cannot be dragged any further. We are withdrawing from all cricket under BCCI," it added. But the company said that it would pay its sponsorship free for the next few months giving time to the BCCI to find a new sponsor. It also promised to pay the dues of its IPL players and staff.

 "We don't want to give any problem to the BCCI and we also feel that the players should not suffer. BCCI will definitely take 2-4 months to get a new sponsor and we will continue paying the sponsorship money till then," it said. "All other IPL team players, coaches and other such associates will definitely get their due this year, in case they do not get a chance to play," it said.

Detailing what it felt were the BCCI's attempts at slighting the company, Sahara was also unhappy about the fact that its logo was removed from the team shirt during the 2003 World Cup and a couple of other tournaments on directives of the ICC.