Nimbus, DD face-off in court

Nimbus Communications today filed a petition in the Delhi High Court challenging the government's uplinking guidelines that directs private channels to share live sports feed of all cricket matches held in India with national broadcaster Doordarshan (DD).

The move comes after talks between Prasar Bharati, the holding corporation for DD, and Nimbus broke down on the eve of the first one-dayer between India and West Indies at Nagpur.

Nimbus won the telecast rights of all cricket matches that are to be held in India till 2010.

In a counter-move, Prasar Bharati has filed caveats in the Supreme Court and in the Delhi and Bombay high courts, saying that it should be made a party to any decision taken by the courts on the telecast controversy.

However, Prasar Bharati CEO BS Lalli also left room for negotiations open by declaring that "the doors were open for discussions with Nimbus" at a press briefing.

Experts said DD could raise at least Rs 35 crore as advertising revenue from the seven one-day matches.

On Friday, a DD official had told Business Standard, "You can classify this as a B-grade series. Advertisers have already made large commitments to Kaun Banega Crorepati (beginning today) and the World Cup."

The talks between Prasar Bharati and Nimbus Sports broke down on January 20 with the public broadcaster refusing to agree to the demand of a 15-minute deferred live coverage of the matches on DD.