Brands
Big FM storms into real estate with Rs 1,200 crore flagship bet
Radio network targets Rs 3,500–4,000 crore in three years as it pivots from airwaves to acres
Lucknow: Big FM is tuning into a new frequency. The radio network owned by Reliance Broadcast Network Limited has stormed into real estate, unveiling Big FM Realty with a swaggering Rs 3,500–4,000 crore revenue target over the next three years.
The opening gambit is bold. The company has snapped up 80 acres on the Lucknow–Bahraich Road in Uttar Pradesh for a flagship mixed-use township expected to rake in Rs 1,200 crore.
The bet rests on asphalt and ambition. The four-laning of NH-927 is set to slash travel time between Lucknow and Bahraich from nearly two hours to about one, tightening links to the Nepal border and fuelling commercial momentum. Bahraich, long overlooked, is now pitched as an emerging growth corridor with rising appetite for modern homes and retail space.
A spokesperson for Big FM Realty called the move “a defining chapter in our journey of growth and transformation”.
“The launch of Big FM Realty marks a defining chapter in our journey of growth and transformation. Having built a strong national identity rooted in trust, authenticity and scale through our media heritage, we are now extending that same commitment to excellence into real estate. We aim to deliver thoughtfully designed, high-quality developments that blend innovation with practicality, ensuring lasting financial and lifestyle benefits for our customers. Bahraich, with its promising growth developments and strategic location, represents an exciting high-potential opportunity, and this project serves as the strong foundation for our wider vision in shaping modern urban living across India.”
The masterplan promises more than plots. The township will weave together premium plotted development, group housing, commercial and retail spaces, pitched as an integrated lifestyle destination with green landscapes, smart infrastructure and sustainable planning aimed at middle-class and upwardly mobile buyers.
Big FM is no small player. The network spans 58 stations across 23 states, reaching over 34 crore listeners in more than 1,900 towns and 1.2 lakh villages. Nearly two decades of brand-building in audio, it hopes, will translate into trust on the ground.
From commanding the airwaves to carving up land banks, Big FM is wagering that credibility can be converted into concrete. The microphone is down; the earthmovers are warming up.
Brands
YES Bank appoints S Anantharaman as chief risk officer
Former Jio Financial Services group chief risk officer takes charge of enterprise-wide risk at the embattled private lender
MUMBAI: YES Bank is not taking chances with risk anymore. The private lender has appointed S Anantharaman as its chief risk officer, a hire that signals the bank’s continued effort to rebuild credibility and tighten the controls that once famously slipped.
Anantharaman arrives from Jio Financial Services, where he served as group chief risk officer and built a risk management architecture spanning lending, payments, insurance broking and asset management from the ground up. Before that, he held the chief risk officer role at Bank of Baroda and senior leadership positions at HDFC Bank and L&T Finance Holdings. Three decades in banking and financial services, in other words, with scars and qualifications to match. He is a chartered accountant and a CFA charterholder.
At YES Bank, his brief is considerable. Anantharaman will oversee the bank’s entire enterprise-wide risk framework, covering credit policy, market risk, operational risk, information security, data governance, analytics, model governance and data privacy. It is, in short, every lever that matters when a bank is trying to prove it has grown up.
YES Bank’s turbulent past needs little rehearsing. What it needs now is exactly what Anantharaman has spent thirty years building: the kind of risk culture that stops problems before they become headlines. The appointment suggests the bank knows it.
