Indigenous comic strip character Chacha Chaudhary will come to life on Sahara TV from 13 May.
Produced by Ketan Mehta‘s Maya Entertainment, the simple, earthy Chacha with the twitchy nose and keen brain will pit his skills against evil villains with native ingenuity and common sense in the serial. Versatile actor Raghuveer Yadav plays the simple detective in this unusual show. Pravin Kumar plays his friend and supporter Saboo, a 20 feet tall alien who can fly his way through difficulties and helps Chacha out of physical fights. The odd yet endearing couple, Saboo and their red convertible who live a simple life are expected to provide a new dimension to Sahara‘s evening programming. The serial will air Mondays to Wednesdays at seven pm.

Invented as a children‘s fiction adventure cum thriller created in a comic format by the famous cartoonist Pran in 1960, Chacha Chaudhary and its characters have attained a legendary platform in the country. The series attempts to bring to the small screen, this famous character and make it available to the much larger TV viewing audiences, says the production house. Graphic technology and innovative special effects have been employed by Maya Entertainment to bring Chacha‘s antics to life. The serial is scripted by Ravi Pandey and directed by Mohit Jha.

Discovery channel returns to India for the second instalment of its reality show featuring babies, World Birthday. The concept involves filming babies born on the same day and Mumbai figures among the cities chosen for shooting on location for the day. Reports say footage will be shot either at the Wadia, Bhatia or KEM hospitals in central Mumbai on 10 July. The show will air on New Year‘s Day 2003.

World Birthday is also scheduled to visit Afghanistan, South Africa, Argentina, Russia, Japan, Memphis and Scotland. As with last time, the channel will concentrate on the cultural diversity across countries and the manner in which people belonging to different races react to a newborn.

World Birthday is a co-production of Discovery Networks International (DNI), TLC (The Learning Channel) and the Granada/New York Times Joint Venture.

Discovery Channel also has plans for a World Wedding Day show. As the name suggests, marriages across the world will be filmed on the same day showing differences in customs and traditions. Launched in 1995, Discovery Channel India claims to reach over 21 million homes and has recently been revamped with a complete image makeover.