NEW DELHI: In the wake of the latest controversies related to the spot fixing case in the Indian Premier League (IPL) and revelations of the underworld?s role in sports betting; FICCI has once again reinitiated its call for regulating sports betting in India.

Despite several attempts to ban it, betting is continuing in an underground fashion and substantial resources have been invested into enforcing such a ban. Thus, the middle way out is to regulate it in a way which reduces this to an acceptable level. Hence, the Government should think of legalising and regulating betting.

India is continuing to lose billions of dollars in taxable revenue (an estimated Rs 12,000 to 20,000 crore annually) through black marketing operations in sports betting. According to FICCI, the greatest advantage of regulating sports betting is going to be the accountability for the large amounts of money transferred through illegal channels and reduction in cases of match fixing, money laundering and crimes.

If gaming and betting is regulated in India, it will benefit the exchequer and could potentially fund sports development, social protection or welfare schemes and infrastructure development plans.

In a representation submitted to government, FICCI has highlighted how blanket ban on sports betting has failed without proper regulation. In fact, this representation also highlighted the number of international examples of different countries who have benefitted from regulating the betting, added FICCI sources.

A system which seeks simply to prohibit rather than control gambling is turning its back on the problem. Ban cannot be implemented but sports betting can be controlled with proper regulation to prevent further deterioration of conduct of sports in country. When regulation arrives, it is true that problems are revealed, actions need to be taken and policies are enforced. FICCI realises the negative aspect of sports betting on the society.

The question now is how to tax the money involved in gambling and we need to devise a system which encourages betting operators to function openly. We also need to devise systems for protection for the young and vulnerable against the dangers of unwise betting behavior but these can be addressed only if we spot the victim and which is possible only through proper regulation. Active regulation is the only real solution - whether the underlying philosophy is to permit or restrict.

MUMBAI: Earlier this month Ficci partnered with the National Association of Broadcasters (NAB) Show 2013, an international conference and exhibition in the field of Media and Entertainment that was held in Las Vegas from 6-11 April 2013. Ficci was approached by NAB to partner with them in celebrating 100 years of Indian Cinema at the show.

Accepting this proposal with the purpose to provide Indian Media & Entertainment Industry an international platform to reach out to the global markets and to showcase Indian Cinema to the intercontinental audience, Ficci took a 10 member delegation to NAB Show comprising of Ficci-Media and Entertainment Committee (South) chairman Dr. Kamal Haasan; Reliance Broadcast Networks CEO Tarun Katial and others.

NAB is an advocacy association for America?s broadcasters. It advances radio and television interests in legislative, regulatory and public affairs. To recognise the contribution of Indian Cinema entertaining the world for the last 100 years, Haasan received an award on behalf of Indian cinema.

To commemorate the 100 years of Indian Cinema, a session ?Bollywood beyond borders? was organised by Ficci on 9 April. The session explored the international appeal of Bollywood Cinema.

MUMBAI: In a single sport country like India, it is important for all the stakeholders in sports industry to come together and build other sports besides cricket through a right model and create an ecosystem that works for everyone in the value chain - federations, broadcasters and fans.

That, the experts believe, will reduce the dependency of sports broadcasters on cricket, which is becoming financially unviable due to steep rise in acquisition of properties.

Television is one of the most important components of popularising sports. It is broadcast rights fee that helps sporting bodies world over to fund the development of sports - whether it be creating infrastructure, developing talent or attracting talent.

World Sport Group South Asia CEO Venu Nair believes the right model for any sports federation in India is to grow their sport by reaching out to as many people as possible. He also cautioned sports federations against blindly following the Indian Premier League (IPL) model.

"Every other day you see an IPL-styled league with a new logo pasted on it. IPL became the success that it is because there was a thriving ecosystem in place before it launched. Other sports won?t taste success by just emulating the IPL model," Nair said, while speaking at Ficci-Frames 2013.

His suggestion to federations: Forge strategic partnerships with broadcasters where both rights owner and rights holder are equitable partners. He also suggested that the role of a public broadcaster should not be undermined in popularising a sport.

"A sport like Football can become popular if it works with a public broadcaster. That will help a sport to be sampled by more people and then make it a habit for viewers to watch that sport," he averred.

The credit for making cricket a huge success on television goes to Doordarshan, feels Nair.

"There were lots of triggers that made Cricket popular. One of those was Doordarshan. People started following the sport because of Doordarshan. It played a large part in driving traction for cricket," said Nair during a panel discussion on ?Sports: Economic viability and the crisis within?.

Cricket commentator Harsha Bhogle, who was moderating the session, pointed out how BSkyB built EPL into a powerhouse in UK.

All India Football Federation (AIFF) General Secretary Kushal Das feels the quality of Indian football has to be on par with international football.

"The problem with Indian football is not so much cricket as it is football itself. Today, football fans have access to the best of Football leagues whether it is EPL, La Liga or Bundesliga. When you compare Indian football with these top leagues, we don?t match up," Das said.
 
Indian football, he feels, suffers a double whammy of almost non-existent infrastructure and lack of talented players. Unless these issues are dealt with, Indian football will continue to suffer.

Das said a partnership between a pubcaster and federation will only work if both the partners work in tandem towards the same goal. In the Indian context, he said the bad quality of production and commentary on DD can put off viewers who are exposed to international quality football.

Another critical factor hampering the growth of non-cricket sports is the lack of clarity on scheduling. An annual calendar that lays down the schedule is important, not just from broadcasters point of view but also for a fan.

Indian Football, in particular, suffers from scheduling problem that has been giving nightmares to AIFF?s broadcast partner Ten Action+.

Addressability & price cap de-regulation

Sports broadcasters at the session batted for de-regulation of price cap on cricket which hasn?t changed much since 2003 while the cost of cricket rights have gone North in the subsequent years. Cost is a structural issue which can only be addressed by ramping up subscription revenues.

Star India Head of Sports Nitin Kureja said the government has to relax price regulation and let the market forces decide the price. "The revenue side has been a huge challenge. In fact, it has been a challenge to exploit all revenue streams. While the cost of cricket rights have gone up, the subscription revenue has not kept pace," Kukreja stated.

"Regulation should have differential treatment for different sports," he added. Star India had bagged the BCCI media rights for Rs 38.51 billion till 2018.

Neo Sports Broadcast COO Prasanna Krishnan opined that addressability was a bigger issue than price cap.

"You can charge 1,000 rupees but if you don?t know how many subscribers you have, it won?t make much of a difference. So in my opinion, addressability is a bigger issue. Digitisation in that sense will be a game changer," Krishnan contended.

He also felt that the mandatory sharing of feeds with the pubcaster has robbed the broadcasters of exclusivity. Pilferage of signals only worsens the situation for a sports broadcaster who has committed millions of dollars.

"The public broadcaster in our country is too cricket-centric. That has to change if the intention is to air events of national importance. Why doesn?t public broadcaster telecast I-League?," Krishnan questioned.

He said the pubcaster is choosing events that are commercially viable.

WSG?s Nair, however, put the blame squarely on broadcasters for the broadcast rights going through the roof. "I am sure the broadcasters themselves know that they won?t be able to recoup their investments when they bid for cricket rights. That is something that we should address. There are certain rights that have some value," he said.

Concurring with Krishnan?s view, IPL CEO Sundar Raman said sports broadcasting is driven by subscription income globally unlike India which is dependent on ad revenue that keeps fluctuating depending on seasons.

"When you are dependent on ad revenue to recover your investments, you are at the mercy of media agencies. Across the globe, sports is driven by subscription. The amount of money that broadcasters get in India as subscription revenue is pittance," Raman explained.

Raman said the addressability of audience is the single biggest challenge for the sports industry.

Apart from addressability, the key to growing sports is to market it well, micro-targetting audience by going regional and exploiting other revenue streams, said Raman.

On marketing front, Raman said the Hockey India League (HIL) did a good job which sports bodies can emulate. The marketing will help build a habit of strong viewing among viewers.

Commentary, he said, is also an important aspect of growing a sport that will help viewers to understand sport better. Broadcasters, he said, should approach different markets by launching regional feeds that will build an instant connect.

"The problem is we tend to treat India as one big mass. There is a big opportunity in regional markets. We should have regional feeds with commentary in regional language," Raman said.

He further stated that rights holders should start exploiting other revenue streams like digital media which will increase the reach of the event. "Consumption of sports on digital medium is increasing, we should tap into this segment but broadcasters are focusing on internet fearing loss of viewers."