HC units apart arbitral award that upheld BCCI’s termination of media rights for IPL

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 applicable quantities mendacity in escrow quantity to the tune of over Rs 850 crore.

A single choose bench of Justice Burgess P Colabawalla handed the order within the arbitration plea filed by WSGI, looking for to put aside majority 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 S S Nijjar (retd), had dissented with the opposite two members.

Through the bulk award, WSGI’s problem to BCCI’s choice of cancelling 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 amass 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 gained 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 carried out between April and May 2008, was a “resounding success,” and after that, disputes arose between BCCI and MSM. The settlement was cancelled 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 choice with majority, which prompted WSGI to strategy the HC.

The BCCI, by senior advocate Rafique Dada, argued that every one agreements of 2009 fashioned a part of fraudulent composite transactions, due to this fact, there was rightful termination of the second MRLA with WSGI. The BCCI alleged that every one agreements had been executed for the aim of diverting Rs 425 crore — which truly 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 contemplate the “enormous benefit” to it, and thus there was “fundamental error” within the majority award.