Rs One Cr penalty for channels refusing live sports feed to DD

New Delhi, Feb 7 (UNI) Private broadcasters, failing to share with the Doordarshan live feeds of the India-Sri Lanka cricket series starting from tomorrow, may be fined up to Rs one crore, according to an ordinance promulgated on Saturday.

The penalty provision would apply to other important sports events too.

The ordinance has been brought to enable a large number of people enjoy the live coverage of exclusive sports events on Doordarshan and All India Radio.

The ordinance gives the government the power to suspend or revoke any private broadcaster's license for operating in India and its registration here if it fails to abide by the new law.

Without this law, private broadcasters who buy rights for coverage of such events would not share their feed with the Public broadcsater and millions of homes without cable TV would miss the matches.

The Sports Broadcasting Signals (Mandatory Sharing with Prasar Bharti) Ordinance, 2007 that was cleared by the Union Cabinet on Thursday last and given Presidential assent on Friday night, has been promulgated from retrospective effect, dating back to Nov 11, 2005.

The Government decided on the measure after the just finished India-West Indies cricket series kicked off without the Doordarshan and All India Radio broadcasting the event as telecast rights holder Nimbus Communications refused to share its content with them.

It shared signals delayed by seven minutes only after court intervention.

After promulgation of the ordinance, Nimbus Communications, which holds exclusive rights to broadcast all international matches to be held in India until 2010, has been left with no choice but to share live telecast with Doordarshan.

The ordinance also says that the guidelines issued by the Central Government for downlinking of Televison Channels on Nov 11, 2005 and for uplinking from India on December 2, 2005 for mandatory sharing of sports broacasting signals will be deemed to be valid and issued under the ordinance, says the final draft of the law.

That means that the two guidelines, which were just an executive order till last week and had been challenged by Nimbus Communication in the court, will now be out of the judicial purview.

A Bill replacing the ordinance will be brought in the coming budget session of Parliament.

UNI