UTTAR PRADESH, INDIA, August 30, 2012, (BBC News): Should the religious festival be a money-spinner? Indian religious leaders have reacted angrily to a proposal to sell broadcast and advertising rights to the world’s biggest religious festival. Commercializing next year’s Kumbha Mela would be highly offensive, they say.The BBC has learned that the state government wants to offset the cost of the event by selling media access — critics say they have no right to. In May, Uttar Pradesh chief secretary Javed Usmani sent a letter instructing the local administration to “generate revenue by auctioning advertising and telecast rights” to the event, BBC Hindi’s Ram Dutt Tripathi reports.
“In this mela different cultures come together — and how can one organisation monopolise it?” says Prof. Dhananjay Chopra of Allahabad university. He says that although it is a religious festival, the state supports it by providing amenities, from security to sanitation. Religious leaders have always opposed attempts by the state or big business to cash in on the event. They say the festival does not belong to the government and they have no right to sell access to it. So the government plan leaked to the BBC to raise money by auctioning exclusive broadcast rights is already proving controversial. Senior state government officials, too, have written to the Uttar Pradesh administration, expressing their reservations over the proposals. When many millions of people gather in the open air, it will be impossible, critics argue, to stop unauthorized people from filming the main events. Analysts say the government plan is likely to cause widespread offense and could spark a legal battle about religious freedoms. “These days, when every citizen has tools to broadcast themselves, the plan is impossible to implement.”