Zee TV filed a writ petition in the Supreme Court on Wednesday, seeking quashing of BCCI's decision to set aside the cricket telecast rights given to it.

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The petition, filed after BCCI decided to annul the bidding for the telecast right and the subsequent withdrawal of ESPN-Star's petition before the Mumbai High Court, sought an order from the apex court restraining the Indian cricket board from awarding the telecast rights to any other channel.

The respondents in the petition, filed by Zee Telefilms Ltd, are Union of India, BCCI, its president Jagmohan Dalmiya, its secretary S K Nair, ESPN-Star and PriceWaterhouseCooper Private Limited.

Zee countered BCCI's claim that the contract had not commenced saying, after the bids for the telecast rights, the channel had emerged as the highest bidder and had been rightly awarded the contract. As the first instalment of payment, the channel had paid 20 million dollars to BCCI, it said.

The BCCI cancelled the award of the contract to Zee on Tuesday, bringing to an abrupt end the fortnight-long litigation before the Mumbai High court regarding the award of telecast rights of the matches to be played in India from October 2004 to September 2008.

Accordingly, ESPN-Star Sports had withdrawn its petition challenging the decision of the BCCI to award telecast rights to Zee Telefilms.

BCCI sprang a surprise, by telling the Mumbai High court that it might even produce live telecast of the three upcoming series including the India-Australia Test series starting October 6.

In the alternative, it said the Board could call for fresh bids, one for the three upcoming series from October 2004 to April 2005 and the other for the next four years thereafter.

Earlier, ESPN-Star Sports insisted that Zee telefilms was not eligible, as it did not possess the required two-year experience in "producing" live international cricket matches.

The matter, however, took an interesting turn after Zee Telefilms pointed out to the court that ESPN-Star Sports similarly lacked the requirement, which they had been holding against the entertainment major.

The High Court had observed that if strict adherence to eligibility criterion were made, both the parties would be ineligible.