The Minister of
Information and Broadcasting, Shri Ravi Shankar Prasad has stated
that the Information and Broadcasting Ministry would give priority
to encourage creativity, professionalism and competition on
Doordarshan and All India Radio as compared to other private
channels. Presiding over the meeting of the Parliamentary Consultative
Committee attached to his ministry, here last evening, Shri
Prasad said that the effort would be to promote creativity so
that development presentation also becomes entertainment. The
other area getting his priority would be films which have growth
rate of 100 per cent and great potential of employment and revenue
generation. He said that he would see that this sector gets
the best incentive, initiative, and support.
The Minister said
that both DD and AIR have the best available talent and are
capable of producing much better programmes, but what they must
do is to project themselves properly and market aggressively.
He said that Government would provide more support for content
creation.
Shri Prasad said
that both DD and AIR would project the 10th Plan
in order to inform people so that they are able to participate
in the implementation of this ‘People’s Plan’. He said that
the Public Service Broadcaster character of Doordarshan and
AIR must be maintained and should not be affected by commercial
considerations.
The meeting was
informed that DD India, the International Channel of Doordarshan
was extremely popular among Indians abroad. It beams live national
events like Republic Day and Independence Day celebrations for
its global audience. Its programming aims at offering an update
on the India’s social, cultural, political and economic scene.
It carries ‘live’ news bulletins in Hindi, English, Sanskrit
and Urdu, hourly news headlines, feature on political events
and discussions on events of national and international significance.
DD India also began telecasting regional language bulletins
in Malayalam, Gujrati and Tamil to begin with. The Channel now
telecasts 18 hours of fresh programming.
The meeting was
also intimated that the Development Communication Division has
undertaken publicity campaign for several Central Ministries
and departments. Rural Development campaign is targeted at 600
districts and 6 lakh villages broadcasting programs in 29 languages
and dialects. Over 1000 programs and 233 spots have been produced
on Health Care, Population and Poverty, Pulse Polio, Blood Donation,
AIDS Awareness, Iodine Deficiency etc.
Doordarshan commands
a viewership of 259 million. As compared to this, among private
channels Star Plus has a viewership of 54 million, Sony 41 million
and Zee TV 36 million. All channels put together DD reaches
259 million as compared to the combined viewership of 166 million
of all channels. Percentage wise, Doordarshan News captures
89.91 %, Aaj Tak 5.47 %, Zee News 2.84 %, Star News 1.32 %,
BBC 0.20 % and CNBC 0.13%.
The members gave
several suggestions to improve Doordarshan programmes so that
it is able to maintain its prime place in broadcasting in India
. Those who attended included Sarvshree Balram Singh Yadav,
Hannan Mollah, E.M. Sudarsna Natchiappan, C Narayana Reddy,
Kartar Singh Duggal, S.S Chandran, A.J. Maroo and Smt Saroj
Dubey.
