ITV

Tag: DD

  • DD’s DTH to expand bouquet to 50 channels in June

    DD’s DTH to expand bouquet to 50 channels in June

    MUMBAI: DD Direct Plus, the direct-to-home (DTH) service of Prasar Bharati, will undergo its first phase of expansion in June this year. As per the plans, the number of TV channels on the DTH platform are being ramped up from 33 to 50 while the radio channels will go up from 12 to 20.

    “DD Direct Plus will increase its strength from 33 channels to 50 channels by the end of June this year. The new channels joining the DTH platform will be from Hindi as well as the regional markets,” Doordarshan director general Navin Kumar tells indiantelevision.com. He, however, did not name the new channels which were hopping on to the DTH offering.

    The private broadcasters joining the DD Direct Plus bouquet will be paying Prasar Bharati annual fees of Rs 10 million, according to Kumar. “Prasar Bharati charges the private broadcasters part of DD Direct Plus annual fees of Rs 10 million and this is applicable to even the new channels joining the DTH platform,” Kumar says.

    In the second phase of expansion, DD Direct Plus will add up a further 50 channels to take the total DTH bouquet to 100 by the end of the year.

    What about offering FM radio stations? There is no development yet on DD Direct Plus’ plan to sign FM radio stations, Kumar says. Under the present policy, FM radio stations can operate only within a particular geographical area and cannot have a pan-India presence. This had come as a stumbling block for Prasar Bharati when it planned to offer space to private FM channels in DD Direct Plus.

  • Sarma retires in June; govt. yet to move on replacement

    Sarma retires in June; govt. yet to move on replacement

    NEW DELHI: Indian pubcaster Prasar Bharati would soon be headless unless the government, too busy with other issues like reservation for backward classes in educational institutions, hurries up.

    On 30 June 2006, Prasar Bharati CEO KS Sarma retires after serving an over five-year term that can be easily termed a roller-coaster ride.

    Following Sarma to the revolving door – sooner rather than later – is director-general of Doordarshan Navin Kumar whose term as a bureaucrat in Delhi ends in August. After that he has to revert to his parent state of Bihar.

    Kumar was appointed as the DG of Doordarshan in February of 2005. Prasar Bharati, an autonomous organization, manages pubcasters DD and All India Radio.

    While the CEO of Prasar Bharati is selected by a three-member panel headed by the vice-president of India, the DG is shortlisted by the board of Prasar Bharati that includes the chief executive and chairman.

    The present chairman of Prasar Bharati, veteran journalist MV Kamath, was appointed during the tenure of previous government, headed by the right-wing Bharatiya Janata Party.
    Prasar Bharati sources said that apart from Sarma and Kumar, there were several other senior officials who are on their way out and would have to be replaced.

    Meanwhile Sarma, a veteran of Prasar Bharati (he officiated as the DG of Doordarshan when he was a joint secretary in the I&B ministry in the mid to late 1990s) has seen over five ministers at the information and broadcasting ministry, which controls the purse strings for the publicly funded Prasar Bharati.

    Despite allegations of nepotism during a time when DD used to outsource marketing of big events, including the money-spinning cricket matches involving India, a wily Sarma has come out unscathed.

    It was during Sarma’s tenure as the CEO that DD floated its subscription-free DTH service, which raced ahead of the country’s first pay TV DTH service, Dish TV, in terms of subscribers.

    For the financial year ended march 2006, for the first time Prasar Bharati clocked a gross revenue of Rs 12.38 billion with Doordarshan clocking Rs 9.68 billion and All India Radio 2.7 billion that signified a growth of 67.67 per cent.

    Some of the achievements during Sarma’s tenure included the following:

    1. Increased focus on pro-active in house marketing of properties.
    2. Successful execution of media campaigns on behalf of government departments.
    3. Rationalization of rate cards to suit the changing market conditions.
    4. A strategic shift from Sponsored Programmes to Self Financing Scheme.
    5. Introduction of blockbuster Hindi Feature Films on DD National and marketing them in-house.
    6. Leveraging AIR’s vast network and unprecedented reach.
    7. Narrowcasting programming strategy.
    8. Publicity support for programmes to create awareness, especially among C & S audience.
    9. Improved billing and housekeeping efforts.

  • Prasar Bharati to beef up DD, AIR news operations with fresh recruitments

    Prasar Bharati to beef up DD, AIR news operations with fresh recruitments

    MUMBAI: Prasar Bharati is strengthening its manpower for news coverage in All India Radio (AIR) and Doordarshan. Responding to a written query on the subject, minister of information and broadcasting and Parliamentary affairs P R Dasmunsi said in the Lok Sabha that the Prasar Bharati board had approved the proposal to position Part Time Correspondents (PTC) in all those districts of the country where regular AIR correspondents are not posted.

    According to Dasmunsi, there are about 90 full time correspondents/editors and 419 PTCs posted/positioned across the country and the process of selection of PTCs in respect of remaining 150 districts headquarters is underway.

    “With this, Prasar Bharati will have correspondents in all the district headquarters of the country. Doordarshan News has a network of Stringers who, along with the PTCs of AIR, provides news inputs from various districts in the country. Besides, Doordarshan regular TV correspondents/news reporters are also deployed to gather important news from time to time for inclusion in the news bulletins telecast by Doordarshan,” Dasmunsi said.

    Dasmunsi informed that, AIR and Doordarshan tried to cover all important news events across the country with its limited manpower and support. “Some events in far off places which are not covered due to infrastructure and manpower shortages are covered by subscribing to news agencies,” he said.

  • Ten Sports moves SC against Prasar Bharati over Windies series telecast

    Ten Sports moves SC against Prasar Bharati over Windies series telecast

    NEW DELHI: The government proposes. Ten Sports disposes. And, the courts find themselves in a bind. Most of the time this could be story of cricket telecasts involving India.

    Now that Ten Sports, which has exclusive rights to telecast the upcoming India-West Indies cricket series, has again moved the Supreme Court today seeking to restrain Prasar Bharti from downlinking the live feed of the matches (read sharing with Doordarshan), the government is likely to act tough.

    A Bench comprising Justices Ashok Bhan and LK Panta posted the matter for hearing on Tuesday (9 May) asking Solicitor General GE Vahanvati to seek proper instructions on the issue as the Dubai-based sports channel has declined to provide the link without payment, a report put out by Press Trust of India states.

    The private channel filed an application contending that if the matches of the Test and one-day international series were simulcast on Doordarshan, it will suffer a huge loss.

    The petitioner said it has already sold the distribution right to Set Discovery Pvt Ltd, which will have the right to license throughout the country.

    Interestingly, Ten Sports has taken refuge behind an earlier SC judgment, saying if interim relief was not granted to it this time round, a judgment the court delivered before the recent Indo-Pak series would become infructuous.

    Taj Television Ltd, owner of Ten Sports, had filed the petition seeking stay of the government guidelines making it mandatory for the sports channels to share feed of sporting events of national importance with Prasar Bharati.

    The court had allowed the live telecast of Indo-Pak ODIs on DD after an agreement was reached between Ten Sports and Prasar Bharati that latter would deposit in court a sum of Rs 150 million and carry the “dirty” Ten signals in toto without booking any advertisement of its own.

    During a brief hearing today, according to PTI, the Bench observed that last time it was a series with Pakistan and “matches of Indo-Pak series are different from the others.” It added, “For West Indies, many people may not be interested.”

    Contacted by Indiantelevision.com, Prasar Bharati CEO KS Sarma refused to comment on the matter saying it was sub judice.

    However, government sources indicated that the I&B ministry is unlikely to bend down easily this time round.

    A source familiar with the developments said, “The government’s plea before the court would be to uphold the downlink guidelines, which are in the process of being implemented.”

    The downlink guidelines state that events of national importance, including cricket, will have to be shared with the pubcaster on a mandatory basis. The ministry has come out with the listed events also, which has been upon after consulting industry stakeholders.

    In an earlier petition in a Mumbai court, Ten Sports has challenged the validity and legality of the downlinking guidelines terming it as arbitrary without the authority of law.

    The sports channel had challenged the Bombay High Court order of 21 December 2005 refusing it any relief. Later the matter pending before the High Court was transferred to the apex court.

  • Sahara, DD ad sales revenues for England series gross Rs 2 billion

    Sahara, DD ad sales revenues for England series gross Rs 2 billion

    MUMBAI: The first chapter of Nimbus’ boss Harish Thawani’s audacious gamble with the India cricket story is over with a battered English side glad to be back in the cooler climes of Old Blighty and the Indians getting some well deserved rest before they head out to the Caribbean.

    For Thawani however, the rollercoaster he’s been on since his Nimbus Communications swung the telecast rights to India cricket for the next four years with a bank-breaking $ 612.18 million composite bid has barely begun. The India-England tour — the first of ten international series (and four domestic cricket seasons) that constitutes the deal — is over and the calculators are out tallying the revenue numbers.

    Indiantelevision.com’s discussions on the matter with media buyers indicate that the series, which involved three Tests and six ODIs (one was washed out), has generated about Rs 2003 million in ad sales from national broadcaster Doordarshan and Sahara One. Going by these calculations, DD accounted for Rs 987 million while Sahara One mopped up Rs 1016 million.

    But what is of critical importance to Nimbus is really how much it is able to net from this series. Indiantelevision.com estimates show the ad sales revenue picture for this series looking something like this: Nimbus’ Net income from DD is Rs 630 million (deducting 25% share to DD and 15% agency commission) and for Sahara it is Rs 864 million. That makes a total of just under Rs 1500 million ($ 35 million).

    Considering that Nimbus’ bid for the India territory rights was a whopping $ 504.09 million, there’s a huge mountain still that Thawani’s privately held Mumbai sports management company has left to climb to clear the profit threshold.

    THAWANI’S GAMEPLAN

    Having said that, and going by a recent report in Forbes, Thawani is already in the clear on the international territory rights (Nimbus’ bid here broke down as $ 108.09 million). The report says that Nimbus has sold BCCI’s telecast rights internationally for $130 million. The jury’s still out on that one though, with some industry observers calculating that Nimbus could not have made more than $ 89 million from the sale of international rights.

    As for the India part, everything points to Nimbus launching its own sports channel before the end of the year and for this the market expectation is that Thawani will soon be announcing another round of funding for this purpose.

    Thawani claims that investors are currently valuing Nimbus at $400 million to $500 million, which would mean that Nimbus has tripled in valuation terms in less than a year. It was last August that UK-based private equity and venture fund 3i acquired around 33 per cent stake in Nimbus for $45.50 million (approx Rs 1.97 billion).

    In conclusion, what is the downside in this gamble (for Thawani and any investor who wants to buy into his vision) and what could be the upside. That is really what will have guided Thawani in making what still remains a hugely difficult play to pull off. As the head of a broadcast concern told Indiantelevision.com, the current thinking is that there is just no way anyone can make more than $ 550 million from this deal. So at the outset itself, Nimbus is looking at a $ 62 million hit on its investment, or $ 15.5 million per year spread over four years.

    But there is the upside as well, which is that with all the new broadcast delivery platforms that are opening (DTH, IPTV, mobile TV) and if all the constellations of a booming economy, a brilliantly performing team and the kind of possibilities that a young on-the-go populace provide are in consonance, then $ 800 million might well be within reach.

    Before jumping to conclusions either way, it might be worth remembering a certain Kunal Dasgupta and his now well documented masterstroke of a gamble on the ICC cricket rights in 2002 for a then unheard of $ 208 million. There is no one who today does not see the SET India CEO’s bid as a really inspired play.

    A potential loss of $ 62 million versus a best case gain of $ 200 million. Which way the dice falls by the time 2010 comes around will determine whether Thawani is ultimately acknowledged as a visionary or someone whose go for broke gamble went bust. Unsurprisingly, there are many a respected industry stalwart who believe that if anyone can pull this off, it is the fashionably bald head honcho of Nimbus.

  • Government demarcates listed sports events

    Government demarcates listed sports events

    NEW DELHI: The government has come out with a list of sports events, excluding cricket, which would have to be shared with the pubcaster on a mandatory basis whether played in India or outside.

    A government communication to broadcasters states that the list will be valid for five years, though implementation review will be done annually by the authorities.

    If Doordarshan is unable to telecast a listed event due to some reasons, then that game’s possible deletion from the list is likely to be discussed during the annual review meeting.

    Cricket related events have not been specified as there are two cases pending in the courts relating to it and involving ESPN Star Sports and Ten Sports.

    The mandatory sharing of feed of listed events is part of the downlinking norms, which were announced by the government in November 2005.

    Asked about the listed events released by the government, ESPN India managing director RC Venkateish said, “We are comfortable with the non-cricket list of sporting events.”

    The list of sports to be shared with DD include the summer and winter Olympics, Commonwealth Games, Asian games and Afro-Asian Games.

    On the soccer front, where the mercury is building up leading up to the Fifa World Cup in a couple of months time, the list includes the semi-final and final matches of Euro Cup and Fifa World Cup. For Asia Cup, it would be the semis, final and all matches featuring India.

    As far as domestic soccer tournaments are concerned, DD will have access to the semifinal and final matches of Subroto Cup, Santosh Trophy, Federation Cup, Durand Cup, National Women’s Football and Junior National Football.

    In tennis, all matches featuring India and the semis and final of Davis Cup will have to be shared with DD. For the Grand Slams and WTA, all the final matches (men’s, women’s, mixed doubles and doubles) feature in the government list, apart from any other matches featuring an India from quarter-final onward.

    In hockey, the World Cup semis, final and India matches will have to be shared with DD. For the Champions’ Trophy, its India matches plus the final, while on the domestic circuit, the Baton Cup and Gold Cup for Women will see the semis and finals on DD.

    In chess, the World Cup final and matches featuring any Indian from quarterfinal onward find mention in the list. Ditto for Chess Olympiad.

    The finals and India games of billiard and snooker World Cups also have made it as listed events.

  • Sesame Workshop in talks with DD

    Sesame Workshop in talks with DD

    NEW DELHI: Children’s educator and creator of the world famous Sesame Street, Sesame Workshop is in talks with Indian pubcaster Doordarshan for an alliance to reach out to maximum number of children in India.

    “Talks with Doordarshan are in early stages, but we are exploring an option to have a weekend window (time band or slot),” Sesame Workshop president and CEO Gary E. Knell told Indiantelevision.com today.

    DD’s terrestrial platform is being explored by Sesame Workshop, a non-profit organization, as it wants to reach out to the maximum number of children through its innovative and educative programmes. Especially those who do not have access to cable and satellite television.

    To target kids in India’s approximately 61 million C&S households, Sesame Workshop has tied up with Tuner International India (managers of Cartoon Network and Pogo) and the New Delhi-based production house Miditech to bring an Indian version of Sesame Street called Galli Galli Sim Sim from mid-2006 .

    According to Knell, ideally his company would like to have a time slot on DD’s terrestrial network that is suitable for children viewing and where Sesame Workshop characters can be used to spread public service messages too.

    Apart from that, the Sesame Workshop-Turner combine will also explore production of Sesame Street in another Indian language, which could be Tamil. Galli Galli Sim Sim will be in Hindi on Pogo.

    “The work on the other language production, apart from Hindi, will start in a couple of months’ time,” Knell said.

    Sesame Workshop is a nonprofit educational organization making a meaningful difference in the lives of children around the world. Founded in 1968, the Workshop changed television forever with the legendary Sesame Street.

    Today, the Workshop continues to innovate on behalf of children in 120 countries, using its proprietary research methodology to ensure its programmes and products are engaging and enriching.

    Sesame Workshop is behind award-winning programs like Dragon Tales, Sagwa, The Chinese Siamese Cat, Pinky Dinky Doo and groundbreaking multimedia productions in South Africa, Egypt and Russia.

  • DD calls for producers to bid

    DD calls for producers to bid

    It’s show time folks. Doordarshan has called for bids from television producers for three time slots on DD- Metro (DD-2): 7:55 am, 5:25 pm, and 6:55 pm. The time slots are of five minutes duration each and involve the creation of film trailer based shows. Producers can pick up the application forms between 6 and 13 March (11 am to 1 pm) from the respective Metro stations.

    Bids are to be submitted between 13 and 15 March between 11 am and 2 pm along with an earnest money deposit of Rs 50,000 and a non-refundable processing fee of Rs 5,000. The bids will be opened on 15 March at 3:30 pm. DD officials have fixed the minimum guarantee at Rs 50,000 per weekday.