News Broadcasting
Rajat Sharma seeks uplink ok for Gujarati news channel
MUMBAI: Amidst the hurly-burly of the news channel business, another one has been lined up to further crowd the airwaves.
This time, it’s the Rajat Sharma-promoted India TV that has got into the action with plans to launch a sibling regional language channel to the Hindi India TV. According to information and broadcasting ministry sources, India TV has sought uplink permission for a Gujarati language news channel.
However, the details of the proposed channel are not forthcoming and India TV was not available for comment.
India TV’s new initiatives comes at a time when other broadcasters, including Sahara, TV Today, NDTV, Broadcast News and Times Global, too are actively working on news and current affairs channels in various Indian languages.
As things stand though, it seems that it will be TV Today’s new offering — working name Surkhiyaan (meaning Headlines) — that is likely to get off the blocks first amongst the new products.
Government sources, while saying India TV’s letter seeking permission came about a fortnight back, admitted that Sharma has requested the ministry to proceed with the formalities on a fast-track basis.
Apart from permission to uplink from India, Sharma’s company has also got the government’s nod for a teleport.
India TV’s post-production and uplink facilities and studios are based on a campus in Noida’s Film City on the outskirts of Delhi.
