After months of desperation, frustration and anticipation, RCB fans can now breathe easy as their iconic home venue will return in IPL 2026. On Saturday (January 17), the Karnataka government officially gave clearance to the M Chinnaswamy Stadium for hosting all forms of cricket matches including IPL games.
This development comes as a massive boost to the RCB franchise, given that they are the defending champions and would have preferred to have the unmatched support of their home fans in Bengaluru during IPL 2026 matches. After their maiden IPL title last year, the victory parade at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium had resulted in disaster, causing a stampede that resulted in multiple deaths.
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Since that horror incident, the venue had been suspended indefinitely from hosting any type of cricket matches. Subsequently, all domestic games that were scheduled to be held at the Chinnaswamy Stadium, including Karnataka's domestic T20 league, had to be moved out of Bengaluru due to this reason.
It must be noted that Bengaluru does have other venues at the Centre of Excellence (CoE) which is located well outside the heart of the city. However, in terms of its location, history and aura, the Chinnaswamy Stadium remains unmatched and fittingly, it will return as RCB's home venue for the next IPL season as well.
The venue was initially scheduled to host games in the 2025 Women's ODI World Cup but the ongoing suspension forced the BCCI to move the games out of Bengaluru. As this verdict has come very close to the start of the Men's T20 World Cup 2026, the next marquee event that lies ahead is undoubtedly IPL 2026.