Cag Pulls Up Doordarshan Over Free Commercial Time
The comptroller and auditor general (CAG) has castigated Doordarshan (DD) for granting extra free commercial time (FCT) to the sponsor of the news-based prograrmme `Aaj Tak' between July 1995 and October 1996, which resulted in a loss of Rs 5.38 crore for Doordarshan.
The CAG report to Parliament said that `Aaj Tak', a 20-minute programme, was telecast on metro channel for five working days of the week from July 17, 1995.
The sponsorship fee for the programme of half-an-hour's duration was Rs 35,000 with 210 seconds of FCT.
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Proportionate FCT and sponsorship fee for a 20-minutes programme worked out to 140 seconds and Rs 23,000.
The CAG said that an examination of records revealed that the sponsor was granted additional 70 seconds of FCT per episode.
While DD received only Rs 12,000 additional sponsorship fee by treating the 20 minutes programme as a 30 minute slot, the value of additional FCT granted to the producer was Rs 1.75 lakh per episode, calculated at the spot-buy rate applicable to this category of programme.
The sponsor benefited Rs 5.38 crore for 330 episodes during 1995-96, it said.
Doordarshan contended that it had programme slots of only 30 and 60 minute duration and had no system of proportionate calculation of sponsorship fee and FCT in case of programme of duration up to 30 minutes and 30 to 60 minutes.
As such, the 20-minute programme was given an FCT equivalent of a 30-minute programme since he was paying full sponsorship fee of Rs 35,000 for the 30-minute slot, Doordarshan argued.
Rejecting this, CAG held that not only did the producer get 70 seconds of inadmissible FCT, but DD lost out on using this FCT to sell spots in the form of additional spot-buy.
It noted that in the serial `Sri Krishna', DD had made such proportionate reduction in purchase of additional spots to DD.
The CAG warned that the practice of allowing full FCT on shorter duration programmes could lead to practices against DD's commercial interests wherein producers would make programmes not of 15, 30, 45 or 60 minutes but of intermediate duration and claim FCT for a full slot, thereby leading to loss to DD on additional spot buys.
The CAG observed that allowing of extra FCT had also resulted in benefit to the producer of `Nazaare' to the tune of Rs 198.87 lakh. The report said the five-minute programme was charged sponsorship fee and allowed FCT as a 15-minute programme.
The then director general of Doordarshan had approved the programme which was telecast from March, 1995 on metro channel on a sponsorship fee of Rs 17,500 per episode.
In lieu of the sponsorship fee, the sponsor was allowed 90 seconds FCT per episode. The CAG held that this decision was against the commercial interests of DD on account several factors.