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Mumbai, May 31: Zee Television today denied
the Cricket Board's claims that it was offered a discounted
price for next month's off shore ODI ties by the BCCI which the
broadcaster did not accept leading to the scrapping of the deal
between the two parties. "The board did not even acknowledge our
letters written between March 14 and last week, let alone offer
us any discount (on the negotiated figure) for the television
rights for the four off-shore internationals next month," said
Zee Senior Vice-President Ashish Kaul.
Kaul's retort came in answer to BCCI
Marketing Committee head Lalit Modi's announcement earlier that
Zee had not taken up the offer of a discount offered to them and
cried off from the deal. He said that Zee's contention was that
the previously negotiated price of USD 6.05 million per match
was not the correct market rate and wanted a discount on this
figure.
Incidentally, Nimbus were offered the same
price for telecasting the matches after Zee's pull-out and they
have agreed with it and have now bagged the deal. "We did not
put any conditions in our letters written to the BCCI but said
that we were open for discussions but they were never
acknowledged by the BCCI," Kaul added.
The matches are scheduled in Ireland (June
26, 29 and July 1 against South Africa) and Scotland (July 3
against Pakistan). The proceeds of the one off ODI against
Pakistan have been earmarked for Prince Charles Charity Trust.
The Indian squad for these four matches and the subsequent
three-Test series against England is to be chosen at Bangalore
on June 12. (Agencies)
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