Broadcasters Upbeat On Uplink

For starters, the facilities are being offered for a limited timeframe "" between 3 pm and 4:30 pm and between 12 midnight and 6 am daily. The cost: Rs 8,300 for the first 10 minutes. Hitherto, they had to collate the news clips from their correspondents via video tape or through the overseas communication carrier. the Videsh Sanchar Nigam.

Among those likely to go in for an uplink figure the Tamil language Sun TV, Malayalam channel Asianet, Telugu channel Eenadu, and Hindi-English BiTV and ZeeTV.

Indian broadcasters are happy that uplinking is now legally allowed. We had applied for uplinking sometime back and we'll do it again now, says ZeeTV chief Subhash Chandra. It's good news for broadcasters.

 

It's a step in the right direction, says Tilak Sarkar, advisor to BiTV. At least they've become amenable to the idea now; earlier they were totally against it.

Sarkar however is not overtly excited about the possibilities. He points out that the high cost of uplinking through DD may prove a prohibiting factor. There are cheaper options such as digital compression through small telecom earth stations. An industry veteran points out that 20 of these nodes can cost about Rs 3 crore and, with another Rs 1 crore thrown in for operational expenses, you have a ready news relaying network. With DD, you will have to go to the kendra and possibly wait in a queue.

BiTV meanwhile has signed a deal to take its news bulletins onto other channels. For starters, its news bulletins are being simulcast on the profitable Tamil channel SunTV.

Star TV, which is expected to start soon news bulletins at 6:30 pm and 9 pm daily on Star Plus, says it's not going to apply for uplinking.

We've contracted Prannoy Roy of New Delhi Television for the news bulletins. We will leave the uplinking issue to him, says News Television (India) managing director Gene Swinstead.

Sarkar, however, believes the day is not far when uplinking will be thrown open to all, be it foreign companies or Indian. You will be able to set up earth stations at some stage, he says. There will be no difference between foreign companies and Indian ones ... after all even the foreign companies are run in India by Indians.

Other channels such as Sony Entertainment however point out that the uplinking facilities will be of little use. We don't have news on our channel; Sony is focused on entertainment. We currently courier our tapes to Singapore for uplinking. So it's of little use to us. But those who are in news will surely benefit.