I&B Ministry
Day 11: FM Phase III auction provisional winning price touches Rs 969 crore; Nasik shows sizeable rise
NEW DELHI: Nasik became the only new city to enter the Rs 10 crore club even as the cumulative provisional winning price slowed down and touched Rs 969 crore against the aggregate reserve price of about Rs 425 crore at the end of 44 rounds on the eleventh day of bidding for FM Phase III.
A total of 87 channels in 56 cities became provisionally winning channels with cumulative provisional winning price. Thus the summation of provisional winning prices surpassed the cumulative reserve price of the 87 channels by Rs 543.83 crore or 127.9 per cent.
Overall, cumulative provisional winning price exceeded the total reserve price of Rs 550.18 crore of the first batch of 135 FM channels in 69 existing cities by Rs 418.68 crore or 76 per cent.
The Auction Activity Requirement remained for the second day at 90 per cent, which was raised after the 37th round on 7 August.
The 13 cities for which no bids have come are Asansol, Gulbarga, Mangalore, Mysore, Puducherry, Rajahmundry, Siliguri, Tiruchy, Tirunveli, Tirupati, Tuticorin, Vijaywada and Warangal.
The demand over the price in most cities fell down by up to three per cent and went down by four per cent below the aggregate demand in Gulbarga.
The Percentage Price Increment (in INR) applicable for the Next Clock Round was just one per cent in Amritsar, Chandigarh, Chennai, Cochin, Delhi, Hisar, Jaipur, Kolhapur, Mumbai, Nasik and Pune.
The highest Provisional winning price – the same as the Clock round price at the start of the twenty-eighth round – was in Delhi at Rs 150.12 crore (for just one channel), followed by Bengaluru at Rs 106.04 crore and Mumbai at Rs 95.09 crore, showing marginal increase compared to yesterday.
Among cities recording more than Rs 10 crore, it rose sizeably in Jaipur at Rs 25.92 crore and marginally in Chennai at Rs 44.23 crore, Pune at Rs 36.56 crore, Chandigarh at Rs 17.58 crore, Cochin at Rs 11.86 crore and Nasik where it crossed the Rs 10 crore figure today at Rs 10.20 crore.
Thus Mumbai is the only citiy, which may soon cross the Rs 100 crore figure.
Ahmedabad at Rs 42.68 crore, Hyderabad at Rs 18 crore, Patna at Rs 17.89 crore and Lucknow at Rs 14 crore remained static.
I&B Ministry
MeitY & Reliance Foundation launch e-SafeHER cyber training for Women
Programme aims to train one million rural women in cyber safety over three years
NEW DELHI: The Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology has partnered with Reliance Foundation and C-DAC Hyderabad to launch ‘e-SafeHER’, a nationwide cyber security awareness programme aimed at empowering one million women across rural India.
Anchored under the Information Security Education and Awareness Programme, the initiative will focus on building digital confidence and safe online practices among women who are increasingly using digital platforms for financial transactions, livelihoods and essential services.
The programme will be rolled out through a community-led model, with training delivered via women’s self-help groups and grassroots networks. C-DAC Hyderabad will develop and localise training content, while Reliance Foundation will drive on-ground implementation using its rural outreach platforms.
Speaking on the launch, Ministry of Electronics and Information Technology secretary S Krishnan said, “e-SafeHER is an exciting opportunity to bring together knowledge and collaboration to build a cyber secure Bharat. Through this initiative, women from even the remotest regions will be empowered to participate safely in the digital ecosystem.”
Echoing this, Reliance Foundation director Isha Ambani said the initiative aims to equip women with the skills needed to navigate the online world safely. She added that the goal is to enable one million “Cyber Sakhis” who can confidently adopt digital tools to improve their lives and livelihoods.
The programme will begin with pilot training in Madhya Pradesh and Odisha, before scaling nationwide through a phased approach. It will use multilingual content, audio-visual modules and blended learning formats to ensure accessibility and engagement.
Designed for long-term impact, e-SafeHER will be integrated into existing digital literacy and women’s empowerment programmes, avoiding the need for parallel infrastructure. The initiative also aims to drive measurable behavioural change, from improved awareness of cyber risks to safer digital transactions.
By combining policy, technology and grassroots reach, the programme looks to bridge not just the digital divide, but the digital safety gap, ensuring that inclusion goes hand in hand with security.
