MUMBAI: Aarti Dabas, the International Cricket Council’s (ICC) head of Media Rights, Broadcast and Digital, has reportedly put in her papers.
While no official word has come from the world cricket body on the reasons for her exit, Times of India reports that Dabas, who has been associated with ICC for over a decade, has been on a shaky wicket ever since the controversy that blew up during this year’s World Cup in the UK over ICC’s audio rights partner Channel 2, owned by UAE-based Ajay Sethi. The production of the world radio feed had stopped in the middle of the World Cup due to a series of related controversies and reports of non-payment of rights fees were also doing the rounds.
“The radio rights controversy was an absolute embarrassment for the ICC, the way it played out. There was going to be some introspection. Players from Australia and all over were flown to London and then not given any work because nothing was moving forward,” TOI quoted sources ‘privy to developments’ as having said.
But if the TOI report is to be believed, the final straw as it were was over the recent announcement that the ICC had reached a ground-breaking partnership with Facebook which see the social media behemoth become the exclusive digital content rights partner for ICC global events in the Indian sub-continent and will also carry post match recaps throughout the rest of the world through to 2023. Star India, the ICC’s incumbent global media partner, was reportedly furious with the turn of affairs.
To quote again from TOI as to what said sources said: “Somewhere, matters were bound to fly out of hand. At a time when you have a big media partner on board and when you’re thinking of opening negotiations with your media partner on the future rights cycle, how can it augur well to bring another player into the room?”
Conspiracy theories apart however, it is a rather “inconvenient truth” (for said conspiracy theorists) that the ICC had in August opened the tender process relating to digital content rights for 12 ICC events over the next four years. This was in the public domain and not some cloak and dagger behind the scenes scheming that was in play. So how much substance this talk of “matters flying out of hand” is based on fact as opposed to conjecture is the big question.
What is not in dispute though is the fact that the radio rights controversy was not just about Channel 2, but also about Delhi-based Sports Flashes, the multi sports OTT platform that had sub-licensed the ICC World Cup audio rights from Channel 2.
Sports Flashes and Channel 2 have been hurling blame at each other over the whole sorry mess that the World Cup audio rights controversy created and the losses that ensued ever since. It is worth pointing out here though, that the Times Group, by virtue of the fact that it holds a significant stake in Sports Flashes, is an interested party to the dispute.
As for the reported (emphasis ours) Facebook deal imbroglio, if indeed Dabas’ exit is a consequence of Star India having raised Cain over the matter, then it would mean that not only did the media veteran have India’s biggest television broadcast network gunning for her, but also India’s biggest print media house (over the radio rights mess fallout).
Separating gossip from fact, the way SportzPower sees this, while the radio rights imbroglio was indeed embarrassing for the ICC and pointed to mismanagement, that there were problems in the tender process relating to ICC’s digital content rights is stretching credulity. If anything, having been witness to the problems that surrounded the radio rights (which incidentally is small change in the larger scheme of things when it comes to media rights), it would be fair to presume that there would have been added focus on due process as a consequence. That would mean some serious artillery ranged against Ms Dabas.
Which begs the question. Why has Aarti Dabas quit? SportzPower is not privy to the “why of it” but what is of more interest to this website is who would be appointed in Dabas’ place.
Word on the street
While on the subject of departures, SportzPower has it from reliable sources that Campbell Jamieson, general manager – Commercial, ICC has also put in his papers. As per the information available with this website, Jamieson will remain in his current position till the end of the ICC Women’s T20 World Cup, which will take place in Australia from 21 February – 8 March 2020.
Related Reports
FB scores ICC digital content rights for Indian sub-con
ICC opens tender process: Digital content rights for 2019-23 cycle
