DTH
Tata Sky revives Indian poetry with Javed Akhtar
MUMBAI: In yet another first, Tata Sky, the leading DTH player today at a literature rendezvous announced the launch of Actve Javed Akhtar service in partnership with Javed Akhtar, one of the finest lyricists of India. This innovative service gives Tata Sky subscribers an opportunity to experience the rich and classic poetic culture with an unconventional and modern approach.
This interactive platform will have Javed Akhtar describing the true essence of some of the most beautifully penned shayaris and dohas of yesteryears, reminding us of its relevance and definition in context to our lives today.This conversational format with Javed Akhtar is followed by shayaris and dohas sung by contemporary artists such as Tochi Raina, Roop Kumar Rathod, Shweta Pandit, Aakriti Kakkar, Abhijit Pohankar and many more.
Apart from the video format, the interactive service will also allow viewers to learn meaning of various Urdu & Sanskrit words used in the Dohas and Shayari with the help of the built-in On-demand option. Thus aiding subscribers in comprehension & enhancing vocabulary.
At the launch, Vikram Mehra, Chief Commercial Officer, Tata Sky said:“Actve Javed Akhtar will enable our audience to relive and learn from the eons of classic Indian poetry with a contemporary touch. We hence associated with Javed Akhtar, who will walk us through centuries of soulful shayaris and dohas.”
Tata Sky prides in being the preferred DTH player with a list of popular interactive services as part of their offerings. Actve Javed Akhtar will be another innovative feather in the cap of Tata Sky. This interactive service is available on a monthly subscription and can be availed by a simple SMS (‘Javed’ to 56633) or missed call (076791 76791).
Commenting on his association, Mr. Javed Akhtar said, “I am pleased to collaborate with Tata Sky in their endeavor to bring back the essence of our literature. This is a project which is very close to my heart as it resonates my love for the subject. The service revolves around the golden shayaris and dohas of Galib, Mir, Kabeer, Rahim and many more, which will continue to appeal to the people regardless of the constant changes that take place in today’ world.”
Tata Sky has partnered with Insync (India’s first 24×7 Classical Based Music Television Channel) to collaborate with composers and 50 singers (fresh talent as well as renowned artists) to create original songs for the service, Actve Javed.
A glimpse of the interactive service:
Doha – http://youtu.be/AuhUiL0TpDE
Shayari – http://youtu.be/422WwmoeLAQ
DTH
Prasar Bharati’s WAVES earns Rs 2.9 crore in first year
Platform scales content, users but monetisation gaps limit revenue growth.
MUMBAI: Big waves, small ripples at least for now. When Prasar Bharati launched its OTT platform WAVES at the 55th International Film Festival of India in November 2024, it pitched a bold vision: a homegrown rival to global and domestic streaming giants, blending video, audio, gaming and commerce into a single digital ecosystem. Five months into FY2024–25, however, the platform’s revenue stands at just Rs 2.90 crore, a figure that underscores the gap between ambition and monetisation.
On paper, WAVES looks anything but modest. The platform has ingested 13,608 titles, totalling 9,495 hours of content, with over 13,000 titles already live. It has streamed more than 575 live events from the Mahakumbh Amrit Snan and the 76th Republic Day parade to the Hockey India League, Kabaddi World Cup and Mann Ki Baat while offering 74 live TV channels and 12 radio channels. With over 10 lakh registered users and more than 200 content partners onboarded, the scale resembles that of a fully operational streaming service rather than a pilot project.
The architecture supporting this scale is equally robust. Built under Prasar Bharati’s Central Archives vertical, WAVES runs on a cloud-based infrastructure with DRM, encryption and an integrated analytics dashboard. It includes dedicated units for content ingestion, quality control, publishing, graphics, marketing and billing, and is distributed across platforms such as OTTplay, Tata Play and BSNL. The offering extends beyond video to include audio-on-demand, e-games and even e-commerce via ONDC integration.
Yet, the numbers reveal a core disconnect. Despite its scale, WAVES generated just Rs 2.90 crore in a market where India’s OTT industry crossed Rs 23,000 crore in 2024. A key bottleneck lies in monetisation infrastructure: subscriptions cannot currently be purchased within the app and must be completed via an external website. In a mobile-first country where over 95 per cent of OTT consumption happens on smartphones, this extra step creates friction that most users are unlikely to overcome.
Ironically, content is not the problem, it is the platform’s biggest strength. Prasar Bharati holds one of the world’s richest broadcast archives, including 45,154 hours of digitised Akashvani programming and 35,723 hours from Doordarshan. For WAVES alone, over 3,800 hours of archival content have been made OTT-ready, including classics such as Ramayan and Shaktimaan, alongside rare cultural recordings and historical broadcasts.
There are early signs that this library holds commercial potential. Revenue from archival content licensing rose sharply to Rs 3.38 crore in FY24, up from Rs 67 lakh the previous year. Meanwhile, free digital platforms continue to drive massive reach, the PB Archives Youtube channel clocked 119.78 million views and added 4,02,000 subscribers in FY2024–25, crossing 1.7 million in total, while DD News has over 5.84 million subscribers.
That, however, presents a strategic dilemma. While free distribution builds scale, it also conditions audiences to expect content at zero cost making it harder to transition to paid models. WAVES, designed as a hybrid AVOD-SVOD platform with advertising and subscription layers, is yet to fully crack this balance.
The broader challenge is not technological but strategic. In an ecosystem dominated by platforms offering seamless payments, aggressive pricing and high-budget originals, WAVES is still bridging the gap between being a content repository and a commercially viable product.
For now, the platform reflects both promise and paradox. It has the scale, the content and the infrastructure but until monetisation catches up, WAVES remains less a revenue engine and more a digital showcase of what India’s public broadcaster could become.
