In a setback to the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI), the Bombay High Court on Thursday put aside the arbitral award that upheld the cancellation of Indian Premier League (IPL) media rights by the BCCI to the World Sport Group, India (WSGI) Private Limited, for all territories in Rest of the World (RoW), aside from the Indian sub-continent.
The arbitral award had allowed BCCI to acceptable quantities mendacity in escrow quantity to the tune of over Rs 850 crore.
A single decide bench of Justice Burgess P Colabawalla handed the order within the arbitration plea filed by WSGI, looking for to put aside the bulk award handed by the arbitration tribunal — comprising former Supreme Court judges Justice Sujata Manohar (retd) and Justice Mukundakam Sharma (retd) on July 20, 2020. The third member of the panel, Justice SS Nijjar (retd), had dissented with the opposite two members.
Through the bulk award, WSGI’s problem to BCCI’s resolution of canceling the petitioner’s second Media Rights License Agreement (MRLA) of March 25, 2009, was rejected.
The petitioner was granted media rights for the IPL for RoW from 2009 to 2017. The arbitration panel had accepted BCCI’s rivalry that MRLA “was part of a fraudulent composite transaction”.
In November 2007, the BCCI had floated tenders inviting bids to accumulate license for IPL media rights for 10 years (2008 to 2017). The tender included media rights in two classes, for the Indian sub-continent consisting of India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Nepal, Bhutan and Maldives and the second class of RoW. Though WSGI received the bid, because it was not a broadcaster and solely a dealer in media rights, it entered into pre-bid negotiations with Multi-Screen Media (MSM) Satellite (Singapore), which had a broadcasting community in India.
Another MRLA was executed between BCCI and WSGI for India rights for a sum of USD 500 million and RoW rights for USD 92 million until 2017.
The HC famous that the primary season of IPL, which was performed between April and May 2008, was a “resounding success,” and after that, disputes arose between BCCI and MSM. The settlement was canceled by the BCCI in 2009.
The WSGI challenged the choice earlier than the arbitration tribunal in 2010. In July 2020, the panel upheld the BCCI’s resolution with the bulk, which prompted WSGI to method the HC.
The BCCI, by senior advocate Rafique Dada, argued that each one agreements of 2009 shaped a part of fraudulent composite transactions, subsequently, there was rightful termination of the second MRLA with WSGI. The BCCI alleged that each one agreements had been executed for the aim of diverting Rs 425 crore — which really belonged to the BCCI — to WSG (Mauritius), an affiliate of WSGI.
Senior Advocate Aspi Chinoy, showing for WSGI, argued that by advantage of the agreements entered into in 2009, the BCCI benefited to the tune of Rs 1791 crore and the tribunal failed to think about the “enormous benefit” to it, and thus there was ” basic error” within the majority award.
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With inputs from TheIndianEXPRESS
