I&B Ministry
MIB organises talkathon with Ministers to mark Modi govt’s one year
NEW DELHI: Even as the Modi Government is marking completion of one year in office, the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) has organised a talkathon with three union ministers as part of its initiative to highlight the achievements of the Government.
In the first Talkathon of its kind, Human Resource Development Minister Smriti Irani, Power, Coal, New and Renewable Energy minister Piyush Goyal, and Commerce and Industry minister Nirmala Sitharaman will be participating for a duration of 90 minutes on 30 May from 6 pm onwards. The programme would be live from National Media Centre, New Delhi.
Talkathon is an initiative by the New Media Wing of the MIB, which connects the virtual space with the physical world. Under the platform, participants in the social media space can post questions on Twitter, which would be answered by the guests. The users can use the hashtag #AskYourGovt to post their queries to the Twitter handle of the Ministry @MIB_India.
The speakers will reply to the queries posted on Twitter, in real time. The event will be webcast LIVE on MIB’s YouTube channel (www.youtube.com/inbministry),pib.nic.in, india.gov.in, www.youtube.com/DDNewsofficial and DD News.
This is the third edition of the Talkathon. It was introduced at the International Film Festival of India (IFFI) 2014 followed by Talkathon with Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu after the Rail Budget. The last edition of the Talkathon was with Finance, Corporate Affairs and MIB minister Arun Jaitley soon after he presented the Budget on 28 February. The latter was especially successful with the hashtag #AskFM trending at Number 1 on Twitter.
The current edition of Talkathon is a collaborative effort of the New Media Wing, Press Information Bureau and Doordarshan News under the aegis of the MIB.
I&B Ministry
Prasar Bharati sets EPG standards for DD Free Dish platform
New specs define 7-day guide, LCN mapping, and device compatibility.
MUMBAI: Your TV guide just got a backstage pass structured, scheduled, and far more in sync. Prasar Bharati has released detailed technical specifications for Electronic Programme Guide (EPG) services on DD Free Dish, laying down a standardised framework for how channels and programme information are organised and delivered. At the core of the update is a defined EPG data structure, covering genre-based categorisation, scheduling formats, and Logical Channel Numbering (LCN). The aim is simple: make navigation less guesswork and more guided experience across the platform’s over 40 million households.
The specifications also introduce a seven-day programme guide window for each channel, alongside clear rules for channel grouping and LCN mapping effectively deciding not just what you watch, but how easily you find it.
On the technical front, the document outlines requirements for Program Specific Information (PSI) and Service Information (SI), including descriptor usage across tables such as PAT, BAT and NIT. It further details service lists and network linkage parameters, giving OEMs and developers a clearer blueprint for integration.
Importantly, the framework is designed to work seamlessly with television sets equipped with in-built satellite tuners, enabling users to access DD Free Dish directly without additional hardware, an incremental but meaningful step towards simplifying access.
The platform will continue to operate on GSAT-15 transponders, using MPEG-4 compression and DVB-S2 transmission standards, ensuring continuity even as the interface evolves.
While largely technical, the move signals a broader push towards standardisation and user-friendly discovery in India’s free-to-air ecosystem because sometimes, the real upgrade isn’t what’s on screen, but how easily you get there.
