MUMBAI: Fifty four channels have submitted bids for the 44th DD Free Dish e-auction, which will be tentatively held on 24 February for MPEG-2 slots.

HSM channels: 

According to sources close to the development, two Hindi GECs Dangal and Big Magic have bid for the auction. Among other HSM channels, seven Hindi music channels including Showbox, 9XM, MTV Beats and eleven Hindi movie channels like B4U Movies, Enter10 are also looking at vacant MPEG-2 slots. All the major players like News18 India, NDTV India, Zee News, Aaj Tak, Republic Bharat have also placed their bids.

Regional channels: 

In the regional cluster seven Bhojpuri channels including Big Magic Ganga, Zee Biscope, B4U Bhojpuri, one Marathi channel, four Punjabi channels and four regional news channels have placed their bids. Moreover, four religious channels are also participating the auction.

Recently DD Free dish increased MPEG-2 slots on its platform. Private TV channels can participate in this e-auction to add TV channels on DD Free Dish, for the period from 1 April 2020 to 31 March 2021. In the 42nd e-auction for allotment of 8 MPEG-2 slots the channels that came on board were mostly new.

As per the rules mentioned by the public broadcaster Prasar Bharati, only satellite channels licensed by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB) would be allowed to participate in the allocation. International Public Broadcasters licensed/ registered/permitted by the MIB can also participate in the e-auction.