Amidst the conflict between sports content distribution company India Sports Flashes Pvt Ltd and Prasar Bharati over the audio feeds right for the upcoming ICC Cricket World Cup 2019, the Indian cricket fans will miss out on radio commentary.
There is a bad news for those, who have radio commentary as the only medium to follow the live updates of ICC World Cup in England and Wales. The broadcasting agency Prasar Bharati submitted before the Delhi High Court that it will not take the feed from India Sports Flashes Pvt Ltd.
India Sports Flashes Pvt Ltd holds the rights for the live audio feed of the ICC World Cup to be aired across Sports Flashes app and web platforms. The media company had submitted before the Delhi High Court that as per the Sports Broadcasting Signals Act 2007, Prasar Bharati cannot broadcast radio commentary of any sports event of national importance unless it simultaneously shares the live broadcasting signal with them.
Prasar Bharati challenged the submissions made by the petitioner, contending that Sports Flashes is neither a radio channel nor a licensee for providing such services.
India Sports Flashes has also alleged that when they approached Prasar Bharati to share the audio content for the World Cup on a revenue sharing model, they were asked to sell their rights completely to the state body, which they definitely don’t want to do, as reported by TOI.
As a conclusion, the Delhi High Court has ruled that neither Sports Flashes “is obliged to share such feed nor Prasar Bharti is obliged to accept the same.”
It doesn’t matter who claims the victory in this courtroom battle, the thing that only matters right now is that the cricket fans in India, who were relying on All India Radio (AIR) commentary to get ball-by-ball updates from England, will miss out on the live audio commentary for cricket World Cup.
Radio broadcast reaches out to more than 90 per cent of the Indian population, and rural India is still very much dependent on it for most of the information.
