upreme Court okays auction of IPL broadcast rights

India's Supreme Court has said the BCCI can continue with the process of auctioning IPL broadcast rights for certain markets for 2011-14.

The board had issued a tender earlier this month offering the rights to distribute IPL matches on television in territories excluding India, South Africa and Australia, among others, as well as the worldwide radio, internet and mobile rights. That decision was contested by World Sport Group (WSG), which bought the global broadcast rights prior to the first IPL and is locked in a legal battle with the board over its decision to cancel their contract last year over allegations of fraud.

WSG had to the tender on the grounds that it violated the undertakings the board had given to the Bombay High Court and the Indian Supreme Court that it would not sell the rights to a third party until their dispute is resolved. On their part, the BCCI argued that the interim stay granted by the Bombay High Court amounted to enforcing the contract with WSG, since it would have to choose between broadcasting the games through WSG and not broadcasting them at all.

According to PTI, the Supreme Court ruled that the tender could proceed and that any money the BCCI made from selling the rights was to be kept in an escrow account, from which WSG could withdraw whatever amount it needed to fulfil its commercial agreements. "Amount shall be kept in a separate account. You (WSG) would take as they require...balance would be there," said the two-judge bench of Justice RV Raveendran and Justice AK Patnaik. The bids will also not be final until the dispute between the two is resolved.

The BCCI had appealed the Bombay High Court's stay order to the Supreme Court and the court had overruled the stay while continuing to hear the case. In June 2010, the BCCI terminated all its IPL media license agreements with WSG over the payment of the Rs 425 crore-facilitation fee (about US$90m) by the parent company of the tournament's Indian broadcast partner to WSG. The board claimed it was rightfully owed the money as the rights to the tournament were with the BCCI.