China steals a march over India, announces global broadcast of Asian Games

Beijing, Mar.26 (ANI): Even as Indian capital New Delhi continues to wrestle with the myriad obstacles coming in the way of it hosting the 2010 Commonwealth Games between October 3 and 14, China has announced plans for the global broadcast of XVI Asian Games to be held in the same year.

Though it has held several Games-related review meetings, New Delhi is yet to decide on who is going to handle the coverage of the event.

A Ruffolo Communications press release from southern Guangzhou described the 16th Asian Games as part of the worldwide Olympic movement.

The main broadcasting service of the Games - The Guangzhou Asian Games Broadcasting (GAB) was established on December 31, 2008.

Interim HD broadcasting plans will cover twelve of the leading Asian Games' events, including the opening and closing ceremonies, athletics, aquatics, gymnastics, badminton, table tennis, basketball (Finals), football (Finals), volleyball (Finals), judo and taekwondo.

The release further goes on to say that compared to the previous Asian Games held in Doha, the 16th Asian Games in Guangzhou would increase the HD signal programming of the Games by seven events.

The GAB's broadcasting signal will be in three modes - HD, SD and ENG. There will be a total of 74 lines of live signals, including 22 lines of HD signals and 52 lines of SD signals with 13 recorded broadcast fields available.

The GAB will be forming 48 broadcast production teams, including three international teams; 43 domestic teams and two standby teams (domestic) which will be in charge of the TV signal production of 42 sports.

Ren Tianhua, Deputy Director of the GACOG Broadcasting and Media Services Department said, "HBS, a high level international producing company with years producing experience, will be invited as the responsible producer of Athletics, Aquatics and Gymnastics. CCTV and Guangdong TV will form the core team for the signal production of 22 other sports. GACOG will be naming experienced TV stations with very good signal producing capabilities in Beijing, Tianjin, Guangzhou and other cities to work together for others sport signal production."

Ren added that "several domestic and international broadcasting and TV networks want to be involved in the Asian Games' broadcasting signal production and expects numerous broadcasting and TV outlets to purchase the broadcasting rights of these Games". He said that GAB plans to hold a signing ceremony in Guangzhou (this May) to name its key broadcast TV partners.

The 16th Asian Games will be held in the "Flower City" of Guangzhou from November 12 - 27, 2010. More than 14,000 athletes from 45 countries and regions will compete in 42 sports. More than 10,000 accredited and non-accredited worldwide media are anticipated to cover the Games with more than three million spectators expected to attend.

In contrast, the Indian Government is still reviewing security arrangements for the Commonwealth Games.

Two days ago, a meeting of the Empowered Security Committee headed by Union Home Secretary and Commonwealth Games Security Review Committee was held take stock of the measures being taken for conducting smooth and incident-free sports extravaganza.

The Indian Home Ministry is still busy with issuing security guidelines at the under-construction sites to all the concerned venue owners for implementation. (ANI)