NEW DELHI: Delhi High Court on 30 May quashed an interim order of the Telecom Disputes Settlement Appellate Tribunal (Tdsat), allowing ESPN to offer the three channels to Tata Sky at the basic tier.
The High Court said that ESPN could retain its offer vide the Reference Interconnect Order (RIO) as it existed on 20 May - a day before the Tdsat passed an interim order saying that ESPN’s RIO was not valid as per the regulation that obligates all broadcasters to offer their channels a la carte to all DTH players.
Tata Sky had earlier argued at the Tdsat that their agreement with ESPN had ended in April. But while negotiations for a new agreement were being discussed, ESPN unilaterally said in a specific clause in their new offer (RIO) that Tata Sky would have to take all the three channels - ESPN, Star Sports and Star Cricket at the basic tier.
ESPN had also reportedly told Tata Sky that if this was not acceptable to them, the sportscaster would disconnect their signals from 20 May.
Tata Sky had argued in Tdsat that this offer was bad in law, as it went against the Trai regulation on DTH.
Then on 30 May ESPN senior counsel N Ganapathi argued before the High Court that Tata Sky had merely prayed for ensuring that there was no disconnection, and not for the specific clause to be set aside.
ESPN argued that the sector tribunal had indeed given Tata Sky more than what it had prayed for, which was not acceptable.
The second count of argument was that Tdsat had passed a final order while still at the interim stage of hearing the case. This was not correct as setting aside the RIO sealed the fate of the case even before the court proceedings were completed.
The court, hearing both parties, quashed the Tdsat order saying that the specific clause of the ESPN offer could remain till the disposal of the case.
Indiantelevision.com Team
(31 May 2008 4:30 pm)
http://www.indiantelevision.com
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