Prasar Bharti in a tizzy over Games telecast

Onkar Singh in New Delhi

Prasar Bharti officials held a series of meetings on Sunday to sort out the chaos that has arisen out of last minute withdrawal by Pritish Nandy Communications from its contract to market the Olympics.

Though Prasar Bharti is an independent organisation and takes its own decisions, Minister for Information and Broadcasting Arun Jaitley was involved in the meetings and chaired on of them.

Pritish Nandy had won the rights to market the Olympic Games for Doordarshan for Rs 150 million but he expressed his inability to do so in a letter to chief executive of the corporation Rajiv Rattan Shah. The reported reason for the Shiv Sena MP walking out the contract was non-cooperation by cable operators, who were unwilling to shell out Rs 6 per connection to telecast the games on DD sports channel.

Nandy had provided Doordarshan with a bank guarantee for Rs 750 million. Though there were number of other bidders, Nandy won the contract because he had bid the highest.

Though what irked the editor turned software programme producer is not still clear, DD officials said he was upset with the involvement of another agency, Modi Entertainment Network, which is responsible for distributing DD's sports channel.

DD officials denied that they had converted DD sports channel into a pay channel at the eleventh hour. This was announced more than a month ago and it was also made clear that cable network operators would have to show at least three DD channels under the New Cable Network law passed by Parliament.

" If cable operators are now raising a hue and cry then it is not our fault. We have been funding the sports channel for sometime and now we want it to generate its own revenues. And what better time to popularise the channel than the Olympic Games. We have paid a huge amount of money for the telecast rights to the Asia Pacific Broadcasting Union. The best way is to recover the money is through advertising revenue and subscriptions," said a top official of Prasar Bharti, who returned to India after watching the opening ceremony in Sydney.

According to him Doordarshan has been preparing for one month to ensure good coverage and has sent a large team of cameramen, producers and technical staff to Sydney. This is however disputed by cable operators.

"The coverage is very poor and people are complaining. We are being forced to show three DD channels because of the new law. We have no option but to pay because the people want to see Olympic Games live. At this rate, we will be forced out of business," alleged a leading cable operator.

This charge is denied by Prasar Bharti officers. " We have not got a single complaint so far. On the day of the opening ceremony, many people rang us to say that their cable operators were not showing it. We told them that the ceremony could also be seen on the national channel. In fact the opening ceremony was telecast live on all DD's important channels. For the benefit of those who had missed it, we re-telecast it. We received hundreds of telegrams and messages congratulating us for a brilliant coverage," said an official.

Rattan Shah is under pressure from various quarters to find an amicable solution to the problem.