Court ruling at midnight and sports coverage changed for ever !

Hero Cup is remembered for Sachin's last over
but it changed Indian Sportscasting for forever

Hero Cup 1993 is remembered for Sachin Tendulkar’s last over bowling. South Africa needed 6 runs off last 6 bowls chasing 196 in the nail-biting final at Eden Gardens.  

Sachin bowled perhaps the best over of his career on 24 November 1993.  Even though it was his first over in this match. His leg spin did the trick and gave away just 3 runs. India won the match and the 5 nation Hero Cup.  

But this tournament went down in the history of Indian sports broadcasting as a turning point.

Indian cricket had always been covered by DD until 1993. But in May 1993, television company Trans World International (TWI) and Cricket Association of Bengal (CAB) signed an agreement for the Hero Cup. And thus started the first Indian battle over sports broadcasts.  Doordarshan which had failed to outbid TWI, refused to allow the foreign broadcaster to transmit from Indian soil. Claiming an exclusive right to do so under the Telegraph Act of 1885. DD even accused CAB and BCCI of ‘being anti-national’.

Though DD saw the grant of rights to anybody but itself as illegal the Ministry of Home Affairs on 13 October, approved TWI’s application to allow satellite transmission and Finance Ministry allowed it to import its own broadcast equipments, waiving customs and additional duties. In sharp contrast, the Ministry of Information & Broadcasting (MIB) condemned it as a violation of the law of the land.

The MIB even disallowed All India Radio from airing ball by ball commentary of the tournament and custom authorities in Mumbai, under government instructions, seized TWI’s broadcast equipments.

CAB appealed to the Supreme Court of India. The court took the matter so seriously that a bench sat down to consider it even if it was a government holiday. On 15 November 1993 at 11:30 PM in an important ruling court overruled the government and allowed TWI to generate its own broadcasts. 

The case was urgent because the crisis of Hero Cup seemed to jeopardize the 1996 World Cup which was to be co-hosted by India, Sri Lanka and Pakistan. The South Africa Cricket Board had threatened to withdraw its support for the sub continent playing host to the World Cup unless the wrangle over telecast rights sorted immediately. Foreign broadcasting partners were already demanding their money back from World Cup telecast rights holder World Tel.  Cricket was getting bigger and bigger and attracting foreign investment.

The 1993 Supreme Court ruling was limited to the Hero Cup. Consequently, BCCI and DD locked horns again in 1994 when the BCCI granted ESPN the right to telecast India’s series with WI as part of $30 million deal which gave ESPN the exclusive right to telecast cricket in India for five years.

Again, the BCCI appealed to the Supreme Court, which in a judgment, which marked the beginning of new era in Indian sportscasting, on 9 Feb 1995 ruled that airwaves cannot be a state monopoly as they constitute public property.  The court ordered the Government ‘to take immediate steps to establish an autonomous public authority to control and regulate the use of airwaves. Thus ended the first Indian battle over Sports Broadcasts. DD lost its monopoly and MIB was ordered to evolve new regulatory framework. 

  

Three years later ESPN & Star Sports formed a joint venture ESPNStar which went on to rule Indian Sports broadcasts till Ten Sports was launched in 2002.

Courtesy : This article is partly based on a piece from Nalin Mehta's book India on Television.