Cricket fans miss out on Team India's win

New Delhi, Jan 21 (UNI) Millions of cricket lovers couldn't watch Team India's thrilling victory over the West Indies today as Nimbus did not share the live feed with Doordarshan or AIR after Prasar Bharti failed to reach an agreement with BCCI's official telecast rights holder.

The two parties failed to strike a deal yesterday despite two days of hectic negotiations and according to official sources, DD might even lose on telecasting the the forthcomng Sri Lanka series as well if no agreement was reached.

No breakthrough in talks means over 55 million households will not get to see the Men in Blue in action and even a larger audience will be denied of live commentary of the eight matches being played as a warm up to the World Cup in Caribbean in March.

According to a Prasar Bharati release, Nimbus, who would be telecasting the matches on the newly launched NEO Sports, suggested a 15-minute delayed telecast on DD's terrestrial channel which was rejected by the national broadcaster.

Prasar Bharati's proposal to air live commentary was also rejected by Nimbus, according to the release.

This despite the Downlinking/Uplinking Guidelines issued by the I and B Ministry make it compulsory for sports telecast right holder to share the live feed of importatnt sporting event with Doordarshan and AIR through a commercial agreement.

The West Indies-India cricket match series is, however, available live on NEO Sports.

UNI