The cricket match fixing saga has spilled over into the television industry. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), which is probing the issue of corruption in India‘s national sport, yesterday sent its investigative officers into the premises of DD officials, TV production houses Stracon, World-Tel and UTV.The CBI believes that DD officials had connived with representatives of these companies, awarded them telecast and air time marketing rights unfairly at throwaway prices, and robbed the government of millions of dollars.

The CBI is investigating deals dating back to 1997 and 1998 related to the ICC Knockout tournament 1998, Wimbeldon 1997, the French Open 1997, The Independence Cup 1997 and other sports tournaments. Stracon, UTV, and World-Tel were involved in these transactions.

Will the CBI come up with a lot of dirt? An industry observer says that it is quite likely that UTV will squeak through clean, but Stracon and World-Tel may find themselves in the box. His view is that the CBI should take a dekko at how some of the officials had their children‘s education paid for in the US, and how one of the officials took a long sabbatical from his DD posting.

The Indian Broadcasting Federation (IBF) has said nyet to state-owned broadcaster DD‘s DTH proposal. DD had proposed that it would own 20 per cent in a DTH venture with the remainder being given to non-broadcasters.Broadcasters would be called to partner it as content providers.

DD chief R. R. Shah met up with private broacasters who are members of the IBF on 13 November. The members apparently did not evince much interest in the proposal and instead asked that the government issue a clarification on the issue of the cap on equity for broadcasters and cable TV operators in a DTH operation.

Private broadcasters have not been happy with information and broadcasting minister Sushma Swaraj‘s statement that the limit on total broadcasting investment in a DTH project‘s equity is 20 per cent. They have been pushing for this to be an individual broadcaster‘s investment so that two or three of them can get together to form a DTH coalition.