Jute Production Prospects Bleak

Some of the major television channels like Zee TV and Eenadu TV, are planning to launch 24-hour Bengali channels before October 1999, the time for the Durga Puja festival, to reach out to the Bengali viewers.

Sensing competition may be round the corner, Asian Television Network (ATN), which runs a 24-hour Bengali television channel, ATN Bangla, targeting viewers in West Bengal and Bangladesh in particular, has firmed up plans to move beyond entertainment to incorporate news and current affairs programme. The news programme will lay more emphasis on West Bengal and Bangladesh.

ATN Bangla, which is telecast from Bangkok and Thailand, to 29 countries, currently draws more than 70 per cent of its advertisement revenues from Bangladesh.

 

ATN is also planning to launch another multi-lingual channel, ATN World, by the end of the current year, which will have substantial Bengali programmes.

The Hyderabad-based Eenadu Group, which has tied up with Scientific Atlanta of the United States to set up a private earth station near Hyderabad, has already bought office space in Calcutta and mobilised its news bureau. Eenadu is planning to launch its Bengali regional channel "Gitanjali" before October, 1999, which will have entertainment, news and current affairs programmes.

Eenadu is investing Rs 120 crore to launch three regional channels in Bengal, Maharashtra and Karnataka. Zee TV has also drawn up a blueprint for a Bengali entertainment-cum-current affairs channel.

Meanwhile, with the election fever building up gradually in West Bengal, major political parties have begun to approach some of the production houses to telecast their message. Two of the city-based Bengali channels operating on RPG Netcom's cable, CCCN TV and CTVN, are being approached by the political parties. One such political party sponsored programme "Ei Samay" is already being cable-cast via CTVN.

RPG Netcom, the largest television cable network company in Calcutta, is currently in talks with another group to launch yet another Bengali news and current affairs channel. eta name=