Convergence is the new buzzword. But you wouldn‘t know it by the urgency shown by government ministers to thrash out issues related to the matter.

The meeting of the Group of Ministers (GoM), scheduled for Thursday to finalise the Bill, has been deferred yet again.

The reason this time. According to government sources, the GoM meeting had to be deferred as members of the group were busy with Parliament proceedings.

No new date has been fixed yet.

It may be recalled that the Bill has already had two redrafts by the Fali nariman Committee before the latest redraft was ordered.

The courts have decided for the present but the battle lines are still drawn between peeved actor Anupam Kher and Zee Telefilms over his summary dismissal from the flop game show Sawaal Dus Crore Ka.

After the Mumbai High Court on Wednesday turned down his petition against Zee, Kher is now exploring options of filing a damage or a defamation suit against Zee. "I have left it all to my lawyers. They will decide whether it will be a damage suit or defamation suit, or to apply for compensation according to the arbitration clause in the letter the court has given us," Kher said at a hurriedly called press meet in New Delhi on Thursday.

Zee, meanwhile, served a legal notice on Kher on Thursday asking him to apologise within 10 days for allegedly making defamatory statements against the company or face a Rs1,000 million defamation suit. It states that Kher had defamed the company in the press by saying the studio set up for the game show allegedly did not have proper electricity and that the programme was bad.

He had also allegedly said there was no coordination between the organisers and participants. The contract did not provide for any of the parties to talk to the press regarding the game show, Zee sources added.

SDCK will air its last episode on Friday with Kher and Manisha Koirala as hosts before taking a break to possibly emerge in a new avatar.

Kermit Channel has ceased transmission in India, the only market where the children?s channel was still distributed in Asia.

Crown Media Holdings, the Los Angeles-based company which transmits Kermit, had been in discussions with Modi Entertainment Network (MEN) for pay TV signals throughout India, about a possible joint venture to leverage Kermit?s subscriber base for additional distribution and advertising revenue.

Both companies have now taken a mutual decision not to proceed further.

Following this development, MEN is in active talks with Hallmark Entertainment Network for the possible launch of a new channel targeting family audiences.

If that doesn?t work out, some sort of an alliance is definitely on the cards, according to sources.

Crown ceased broadcasting Kermit in all other Asian markets in November. Instead, six hours of dedicated programming for kids was added daily to the Hallmark feed. Three hours midmorning and three in the afternoon. The company now will take the same approach in India.

The decision to pull out Kermit from India was apparently taken by EM TV of Germany. EM holds the controlling stake in the channel after it bought out Kermit creator Jim Henson?s 50% holding.

Sony Entertainment Television?s Jeeto Chappar Phaad Ke (JCPK), which is set for launch in January, is generating a tremendous response from the public with over 900,000 entries received in just 12 days.

Rekha Nigam, senior VP, programming and production, said there would have been an even heavier rush if entries had been allowed through call centres and the Internet rather than only on competition postcards. The cut-off date for sending in the postcards was 25 November.

Sony looks to have a winner on its hands if the advance buzz around the channel?s riposte to Star TV?s Kaun Banega Crorepati (KBC) is anything to go by. Ten second ad spots have been sold at Rs275,000 which is much higher than what Star charged for KBC (Rs80,000) at the time of its launch. KBC rates peaked at Rs450,000 and has now settled at Rs350,000.

BANGALORE: The 10th Additional City Civil and Sessions Special Court (electricity act) Bangalore has issued summons against Hathway Cable Network Bangalore, Bangalore Electric Supply Company (BESCOM), junior engineer Ramanjanappa and Bangalore Mahanagara Palike (BMP) assistant executive engineer Govindiaih on the death of a young boy Anish who lost his life in July due to electric shock from a loosely hung live cable wire.