Delhi‘s district court today ruled in favour of ESPN Software India Ltd in a case filed by Home Cable Network Ltd. ESPN Software India Ltd. had switched off the ESPN and STAR Sports services to the Delhi-based Home Cable Network last Friday on account of the unauthorised distribution of channels by Home Cable Network to hotels and the non-payment of monthly dues to ESPN Software.

The court summoned the managing director of Home Cable Network Ltd. Vikki Choudhary today and ordered him to give an undertaking to the court that he would stop the unauthorised distribution of ESPN, STAR Sports signals to hotels with immediate effect.

The case was originally slated to come up for hearing yesterday.

Sony Entertainment, the flagship channel of the SET network, celebrated its sixth 6th anniversary yesterday and CEO Kunal Dasgupta asserts it is as good a time as any to serve notice on rivals Star and Zee that the channel wars are by no means over.

He further states: "The new Friday starry launches could not shake our favourites, the all new Dil se Dosti, Boogie Woogie, Heena, CID & Aahat which have successfully seen off the backs of a rapidly weakening competition. I can sense the viewer boredom and fatigue from the leader and we will strike now. Coming up is a brand new exciting vibrant channel identity package."

"Ekta Kapoor‘s Kutumb will debut in October prime time (the daily soap debuts at the end of the month). By the end of the year we would have launched seven new pulsating shows crowning it with Shubh Vivaah, Madhuri Dixit‘s TV debut. This will be the point at which SET will lead again. The biggest blockbusters Kaho Na Pyar Hai, Mohabbatein & Mission Kashmir will premier in the Festival season. Divine blessings have come our way by our leadership on Sunday mornings through the grace of Sri Krishna, Sri Ganesh and Mahabharat. I am so enthused that every individual in SET is now working with renewed vigour. Our encryption was seamless and no viewer suffered."

Dasgupta also declared that the channel was being completely repackaged, the details of which would be unveiled shortly.

The shows Sony is launching in the next three months are - Kutumb, Achaanak, Kal, Dhadkan, Hubahu, Hum Hain Dilwale, Shubh Vivaah.

In Kutumb Ekta takes the intra-family feud out of the saas-bahu (mother-in-law vs daughter-in-law) feud format into the husband vs wife domain.

The storyline in a nutshell - hate begets marriage, marriage begets love. The protagonist is a spoilt rich brat from a Gujarati family who falls for a girl in his college. She spurns him as she is already engaged to someone else. To cut to the chase. He manages to get the engagement broken off and manoeuvres matters in such a way that ultimately the two get married hating each other‘s guts. Love triumphs in the end of course.

Kal - another Ekta production (naturally considering the K in the name) - is "inspired" by the life of Jack Nicholson. The hero is a teenager who when he turns 15 discovers that the person he thought was his sister is actually his mother. And his mom is actually his grandmother. Convoluted? The basic premise is from a true-life tale mind you. To continue, he is shattered when he learns the truth and leaves home. He becomes a wastrel but comes back to the fold when the father dies and he is left as the chief heir in the will.

Dhadkan (the title has not been finalised yet and may finally become Doctors) is modeled on such popular series set around hospitals as Chicago Hope and ER.

All in all quite an interesting line-up. The coming months should see how far Dasgupta is able to take Sony in its attempt to get on the channel leaderboard.

There is one television network that all major news networks are sourcing for any worthwhile footage on the world‘s most wanted man - Osama Bin Laden. Need actual footage from inside the heart of the Taliban‘s Afghanistan‘s and it is Al-Jazeera that is providing it.It is the first 24-hour satellite news network in the Arab world. It is also the first Arab news outlet that offers uncensored information and free interpretation of political events.

Qatar may be one of the smallest states in the world, with a population of only 690,000, but its state-funded Al-Jazeera satellite television network is certainly big on the news front.

Algerian anchor Khadija Ben Guenna on Al-Jazeera. (Courtesy Time)

Consider what it has had to contend with over the last few months: In April, Libya abruptly withdraw its ambassador after Al-Jazeera broadcast an interview with a Libyan opposition figure. Shortly thereafter, the Iraqi government lodged a complaint with Qatari officials when Al-Jazeera reported the enormous expenses of Saddam Hussein‘s lavish April 28 birthday celebration. On May 2, Tunisia‘s ambassador complained to Qatar‘s foreign ministry about a programme on Al-Jazeera that accused his government of human rights violations.

A week later, the Iranian daily Jomhuri-ye Eslami, a conservative newspaper aligned with Ayatollah Khamenei, accused the station of "attributing false news to the esteemed leader of the revolution" after it reported that Khamenei favoured the annulment of Iran‘s February parliamentary elections.

Post-11 September, it is the Bush administration that has been seeing red. It is pressuring Qatar to restrain Al-Jazeera saying it is unbalanced and encourages anti-American sentiment in the Middle East.

The issue was raised by Secretary of State Colin Powell on 3 October at a meeting in Washington with the emir of Qatar, Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani.

By far the most popular satellite news channel in the Middle East, it is programmes such as "The Opposite Direction" and "The Other Opinion," modeled on CNN‘s Crossfire, featuring debates on controversial issues, pitting Islamist militants against secular liberals, supporters of the peace process with Israel against its opponents, etc., that have earned it such enormous cachet with its viewers. The station frequently interviews political dissidents of every imaginable persuasion.

The first interview that Bin Laden gave after the 1998 bomb attacks on US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania that killed 224 people, and which he has been implicated of masterminding, was to Al-Jazeera in June 1999. During Israel‘s elections last year, the station sent its star correspondent, Muhammad Kreishan, to interview representatives of all major political parties, including an David Bar-Illan, an adviser to former prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Since it was started in 1996 by Sheik Hamad, Al-Jazeera has revolutionized the media scene in the Arab world with its vibrant and lively debates. Although Al-Jazeera, which means "the Peninsula" in Arabic, receives a $30-million annual subsidy, the Qatari government does not exercise direct control over the channel‘s policies. The station is also supported by advertising and subscriptions.

Technical Specifications:
Satellite : Arabsat IIA
Ku Band at 26 East
Downlink Polarisation : Horizontal
Frequency : 12521 MHz

Satellite : Eutelsat II F3
Ku Band at 16 East
Downlink Polarisation : Horizontal
Frequency : 11808 MHz