SITI CABLE ROLLS OUT CABLE MOVIE CHANNEL

The Rupert Murdoch-Subhash Chandra-owned cable TV network Siti Cable flagged off the national rollout of its 18-hour Hindi movie channel Siti Cinema at a grand event in Mumbai. The channel will telecast new Hindi movies simultaneously to its 3 million subscribers all over India. The management claims it will have access to a 1,500 film strong library. Programming created specifically for Siti Cinema will also be telecast.

The network has been under pressure to launch a cable TV movie channel ever since the Hinduja-run InCablenet and Hathway Cable TV started their own services CVO and CineCable, respectively. Both offer a staple of Hindi movies and movie and entertainment-related programs.

All, however, didn't appear to be hunky-dory with Siticable at the launch event in Mumbai. Only a couple of its joint venture partners in the city turned up for the launch event. Siti Cable has close to a dozen joint ventures in Mumbai.

Siti Cinema is offering region-specific advertising packages to advertisers and has priced its commercial rates a tad higher than rivals CVO and Hathway.