The entire event takes place on home and away basis culminating into multi header playoffs. The International Hockey Federation (FIH) has sanctioned the event and also provided a 30-day window at the beginning of next year so that all top players can participate.

The first season of HIL will be played from 14 January to 10 February. The Chairman of the Hockey India League is Narinder Batra.

First season of Hockey India League will be played from 14 January to 10 February with five city-based franchises on home and away basis. It was originally planned as a tournament with six contesting teams but the sixth franchise (Bangalore) remained unsold.

Indian hockey's chief sponsor Sahara India Pariwar bought the first franchise of the proposed Hockey India League (HIL) based in Lucknow.Jaypee Group picked up the Punjab based franchise. Ranchi became the third franchise for this league owned by Patel-Uniexcel Group. Business house Wave Group bought Delhi franchise making it the fourth of the six teams. Mumbai became the fifth franchise which was bought by the Burman family who are the promoters of Dabur India Ltd.

The remaining one franchise, Bangalore, remained unsold resulting in a five team event. India Cements, the current owners of the most successful IPL franchise, Chennai Super Kings, received a proposal from Hockey India in owning Chennai based franchise.

Each HIL franchise has 24 players which include 10 foreign and 14 Indian players. The players were acquired in an auction which was held on 16 December.

A total of 246 players were available for the auction out of which 93 were foreign player and 153 local.

Teun de Nooijer is the highest paid player of the league who was bought by Uttar Pradesh Wizards whereas Sardar Singh is the highest paid Indian player bought by Delhi Wave Riders.

The participating players were given the privilege to choose their base price which will have four slabs.

Hockey India announced three players each from India and overseas as marquee players in the players' auctions which include Sardar Singh, S.V. Sunil, Sandeep Singh, Australian Jamie Dwyer, German Moritz Fürste and Teun de Nooijer from Netherlands.

Hockey India League (HIL) signed a multi-year title sponsorship deal with the two-wheeler manufacturer Hero MotoCorp, for the title sponser of the tournament, making it the Hero Hockey India League.

Hockey India League also roped in telecommunications services company, Bharti Airtel, as the associate sponsor for the event.

Hockey India (HI) appointed Steve Catton as competitions director for the tournament. Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs Rajeev Shukla, leader of the opposition in Rajya Sabha Arun Jaitley and media personality Rajat Sharma are the members of the board of Hockey India League (HIL).

Rajiv Shukla is also the chairman of the Indian Premier League Governing Council while Arun Jaitley serves as the vice-president of BCCI from North Zone. Along with Steve Catton, Barry Anderson is also appointed as the tournament director.