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Ten Sports agrees to give live feed to DD
Onkar Singh in New Delhi |
March 16, 2004 09:18 IST
After uncertainty on Monday, cricket fans will now get to see the one-day international match between India and Pakistan in Rawalpindi with international channel Ten Sports agreeing to give the telecast signals to Doordarshan.
Within hours of his arrival in Delhi, the head of Ten Sports Abdul Rahman Bukhatir directed his organisation and its distributors Taj TV India Pvt Ltd and cable giant Modi Entertainment Network to abide by order of the Supreme Court and hoped that viewers in India would enjoy Tuesday's one-day international with Pakistan.
"We believe that the Supreme Court and the Government of India will act fairly in ensuring proper compensation for rights Ten Sports had to share," Bukhatir said.
He, however, expressed concern that Ten Sports rights investment had damaged over the recent past.
He said: "I believe these developments are a fundamental blow to the system of Intellectual Property rights. Ten Sports has been unilaterally compelled to share its exclusive rights with third party without any predetermined agreement and compensation."
On Monday there was a lot of confusion over whether cricket fans in India would be able to watch the India-Pakistan ODI in Rawalpindi live.
The Indian distributor of Ten Sports had given a veiled threat that no signal may come to India for the matches. Taj TV Private (India) Ltd, Ten Sports' Indian distributor, told the Apex Court said that it does not own the rights over the telecast signals generated from Pakistan and giving simultaneous telecast feed to Doordarshan was a breach of its contract with the original telecast rights holder, Taj TV Private Ltd, Dubai.
The Apex Court had earlier had asked Doordarshan to deposit Rs 10 crore (Rs 100 million) with the Registrar General of the Supreme Court of India as guarantee money, and show all the advertisements and the logo of Ten Sports.
Doordarshan has agreed to deposit Rs 10 crore guarantee money and also show all the advertisements and the logo of Ten Sports, Prasar Bharati chief K S Sarma said.
Additional inputs: PTI