By IANS,
New Delhi : The stand-off between the organizers of the Indian Premier League (IPL) and the media, both print and electronic, was finally sorted out Tuesday, though there still appears to be an element of confusion over the dedicated cricket websites using news agency photographs.
A top IPL official told IANS that though the organizers have dropped contentious clauses about accreditation of photographers, Press Trust of India (PTI) has some reservations about them and has decided to cover the multi-million-dollar Twenty20 league under protest.
However, the Indian Newspapers Society (INS) is believed to have accepted the modified media guidelines of the IPL for photographers.
PTI Executive Editor V. Chandrasekhar told IANS: “We are covering the IPL under protest since we cannot deprive our subscribers of news. The issue of selling photographs to stand-alone cricket websites still stands and we are still opposing it.”
The IPL official clarified that it had no objection to a reasonable number of photos being used by dedicated websites. However, PTI and other news agencies do not want a cap on the number since the subscribers have the right to get all the pictures the news agencies put out.
The official reiterated that the organisers have addressed all issues raised by the news agencies and websites, including those pertaining to the dedicated cricket web-sites.
The news agencies are also not clear as to how to go about the accreditation process since the last date was April 10 and now that only two days are left for the event to get under way.
IPL chairman and commissioner Lalit Modi Monday agreed to extend the date for accrediting news agencies.
Earlier, president of the Board of Control for cricket in India (BCCI) Sharad Pawar told reporters that he would ask Modi to see that all outstanding media issues are resolved without any more delay.