The Supreme Court on Thursday deferred the hearing of the telecast dispute between Ten Sports and Prasar Bharati till May 3 when the new Chief Justice of India S Rajendra Babu will head the bench to hear the matter.
Chief Justice V N Khare, who lays down office on April 30, while deferring the hearing of the case said that the two judges Justice N Santosh Hegde and Justice S H Kapadia will continue to hear the case.
The bench directed Ten Sports' India to file all relevant documents by May 3.
Pravin Pariekh, advocate for Ten Sports, told rediff.com that his client was forced to seek an adjournment as Prasar Bharati had filed an affidavit in the court asking for details of commercial deals.
Prasar Bharati, he said, wanted to know from Ten Sports the amount of additional revenue the Dubai-based channel generated by putting its live feed of the India-Pakistan cricket matches on Doordarshan.
"Prasar Bharati has asked for details of our agreements with the sponsors and other commercial deals. I am not sure if we would be able to file all the commercial details. I would have to sit with my client and see what we can file and what we can object to. Then the court can decide whether to give a ruling or appoint an arbitrator to mediate between Prasar Bharati and Ten Sports," he said.
He rejected the Prasar Bharati's claim that it has also incurred losses because of faulty agreement.
"Prasar Bharati has no case to claim losses. In fact, Ten Sports would be claiming damages. The quantum of damages would be decided later. Why should Prasar Bharati claim damages? They cannot say that they have incurred commercial losses because of us. We were not willing to even give them signals for telecasting the matches. If there were no signals then what would have they done with their advertisements. We gave signals because of the Supreme Court order," Pariekh said.
Prasar Bharati had deposited Rs 50 crore (Rs 500 million) with the registrar of the Supreme Court last month soon after the commencement of the one-day international matches between India and Pakistan.
Attorney General Soli Sorabjee appeared for Prasar Bharati.
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