MUMBAI: The all new revenue consciousness is making public broadcaster Prasar Bharati to get a bigger share of advertising from the government and public sector undertakings (PSUs) on its channels, Prasar Bharati CEO Jawhar Sircar told Mint newspaper in an interview.

He also said Prasar Bharati needs to sell ad spots on All India Ratio (AIR), DD News and DD main channel separately and for this purpose, repositioning and freshening up of DD News is under way.

The public broadcaster is planning to revamp its marketing channel. It will consists of two additional directors general (DGs) and their teams in Mumbai, where the companies are located. "Currently, roughly half the revenue comes from the marketing wing and the other half from government commercial wing. There are a lot of doables on these two counts," Sircar said.

Sircar also mentioned that recent report by Crisil and NSSO (National Sample Survey Office) shows that the highest consumption is taking place in the rural areas. "Not even our worst rivals can doubt we have complete monopoly in that market, especially in villages with scattered houses. Even in the most difficult places, we have terrestrial transmission."

He also believes that marketing has to relate to reports that come out periodically that rural India spending is higher than urban India. "We are rural India. That nexus has to be drawn."

According to him, there are roughly 10 million DD Direct DTH homes. There would be another at least 15 million terrestrial-only DD homes. "So, 25 million viewers are completely loyal to us. All the private operators also carry DD."

Also, on DD Direct Plus, the company is planning to begin default advertisements. "All the private operators have these when you switch on their systems. So, unlike them, I cannot charge the customer, but I can charge the company," he added.

The company has set a target of getting Rs 20 billion revenue a year. Sircar told Mint that Prasar Bharati earned Rs 169 million from London Olympics. Simulcast properties like Coke Studio (an MTV show) helped the channel make Rs 2.5 million per episode while it made Rs 140 million because of simulcasting Satyamev Jayate, Sircar said.

NEW DELHI: Prasar Bharati is striving to bridge the gap between its annual expenditure and revenue amid government pressures to lean less on it for financial support.

While the government has made it clear that it will only fund the capex requirements and expenses towards salaries, the pubcaster has settled on an operational expenditure capped at Rs 20 billion for the fiscal while its income hovers in the region of Rs 16 billion as it competes against private television and radio broadcasters.

So how does Prasar Bharati cut its financial coat to match the cloth that it has? The pubcaster, which has to look after Doordarshan and All India Radio (AIR), is banking on generating additional revenue of Rs 4 billion with aggressive marketing to promote its clutch of channels and radio stations.

The government had last month approved the financial restructuring of Prasar Bharati, stating that from this year the public broadcaster would have to ensure its operating expenses, other than salaries, are met from revenue earnings. The government had agreed to meet all the expenses of Prasar Bharati towards salary and salary-related expenses from its non-plan account for five years from 2012-13 to 2016-17.

Says Prasar Bharati CEO Jawhar Sircar, "After the Union Cabinet decision, Prasar Bharati?s annual operational expenditure would be in the range of Rs 15 billion to 20 billion, whereas the annual revenue currently is around Rs 16 billion. Therefore, we need to generate additional revenue of Rs 3.5 billion to Rs 4 billion and that is where our renewed emphasis on marketing is important."

Prasar Bharati has decided on an aggressive marketing policy to promote the advertisement revenue and viewership/listenership of Doordarshan and AIR that is expected to bring in an additional Rs 4 billion every year.

Rejuvenated by the recent Cabinet decision providing the pubcaster financial relief of Rs 120 billion after the recommendations of a Group of Ministers, Doordarshan and AIR have decided that marketing and revenue would be their two thrust areas. Prasar Bharati has also put special emphasis on different revenue streams and innovative methods for garnering additional income.

With the Cabinet also approving the transfer of numerous properties and infrastructure across the country - radio stations, television kendras, transmitters - to Prasar Bharati, the pubcaster has decided to leverage these new assets to earn more money.

The Prasar Bharati board, thus, unanimously approved Sircar?s proposal to hire professional marketing executives at market salary levels in order to help the public broadcaster come up with innovative revenue generation plans.

Prasar Bharati board unanimously passed a special resolution to thank Information and Broadcasing Minister Ambika Soni and Finance Minister P Chidambaram for the waiver of Rs 120.71 billion of loans, interest thereon and satellite charges that had accumulated over the years.

The waiver will help Prasar Bharati to pay greater attention to other areas of concern, including the free to air direct-to-home DD Direct Plus, technology (including new media), and its priceless archival treasures, according to Prasar Bharati officials.

NEW DELHI: Prasar Bharati is planning to soon move the Competition Commission of India (CCI) against Television Audience Measurement (TAM) for not covering markets where pubcaster Doordarshan had a strong reach.

The Prasar Bharati Board which met here yesterday approved the draft of the petition prepared earlier by the pubcaster?s national broadcaster.

Prasar Bharati CEO Jawhar Sircar said, "Doordarshan?s reach and viewership is its strength. Even when the television industry wants to reach more viewers, they acknowledge it like in the case of programmes like Satyamev Jayate. This reach should be reflected in the ratings."

Sircar had earlier told Indiantelevision.com that it was astonishing that TAM had been side-stepping Doordarshan, which has the largest reach terrestrially through local cable operators and around 20 per cent of the market through various DTH platforms.

Sircar said it was astonishing that TAM had never attempted to give the ratings of DD viewership despite its being the largest broadcaster and the fact that every platform has to mandatorily show its channels.

Earlier this month, Doordarshan Director General Tripurari Sharan told Indiantelevision.com that the final draft had been prepared and cleared by legal counsel.

The Prasar Bharati Board had taken up the matter in its meeting on 6 August and given the go-ahead to DD to proceed with the matter, and approved the draft yesterday.

The Ministry had written a letter to TAM and its international partner Nielsen earlier, wanting to know the steps taken to improve the television rating measurement system and ordering for a third party audit to be conducted with an increased sample size.

The Ministry had also written to the Telecom Regulatory Authority of India (Trai) for suggestions on an accreditation mechanism for TV ratings in India to curb the monopoly and asked it to frame guidelines in context to cross holdings in companies that are involved in TV ratings system in India.

Trai had on 19 August 2008 issued Recommendations on the Policy Guidelines and Operational issues for Television Audience Measurement Television Rating Points (TRPs) suggesting Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC), a suggestion which was later endorsed by the Amit Mitra Committee.

The action by Prasar Bharati comes on the heels of the case filed by NDTV in a New York court against The Nielsen Co and Kantar Media Research, equal partners in TAM Media, in this regard.

NEW DELHI: Information and Broadcasting Minister Ambika Soni said Saturday that the appointment of a new chief executive officer for Prasar Bharati - Jawhar Sircar ? would result in expediting all pending issues in the pubcaster, especially those related to employees.

Vacancies in Doordarshan and All India Radio would be filled and efforts will be made to make all stations and those in the border areas functional, Soni said.

"While maintaining the autonomous structure of Prasar Bharati, I want issues related to staff resolved because they have been pending for a very long time," Soni told reporters here.

"We have recently formed recruitment rules after forming a recruitment board. We are now awaiting the clearances from the Department of Personnel and Training. So wherever there are slots vacant, they should be filled urgently," she added.

"More programmes should be generated in local languages and Doordarshan and Akashvani should reflect a picture of the entire country," Soni said.

NEW DELHI: Jawhar Sircar, until now secretary in the culture ministry, is to be the new chief executive officer of Prasar Bharati.

Sircar?s name was cleared after a three-member selection panel headed by Vice-President Hamid Ansari with Press Council of India chairman Justice Markanday Katju and Information and Broadcasting secretary Uday Kumar Varma as members recommended his name for the position. The appointment of the CEO is done by the President on the recommendation of the selection panel.

Indiantelevision.com had earlier reported that Sircar was tipped to be the CEO.

Sircar is due to retire from his present job next month, and will take over from acting CEO Rajiv Takru, the Additional Secretary in I&B ministry and its representative on the Prasar Bharati board.

Takru had been asked to hold additional charge of CEO in January last year after the suspension of then CEO B S Lalli, following a series of corruption charges established by the Central Vigilance Commission.

However, the search for a successor could begin only after Lalli retired in December. It is learnt that a panel of 11 members was sent to the three-member committee.

Sircar belongs to the 1975 batch of Indian Administrative Service from West Bengal. After the retirement of I&B secretary Raghu Menon in September last year, Sircar had been asked to hold additional charge of this ministry in addition to the culture ministry, until the appointment of Uday Kumar Varma.

Sircar holds two post-graduate degrees in Ancient Indian History and Culture and in Sociology with Social Anthropology. He has served as additional (later special secretary) secretary and development commissioner for micro, small and medium enterprises in the centre, prior to which he held the posts of higher education secretary and principal secretary of commerce and industries in West Bengal.

Sircar has been actively associated with several cultural and academic bodies like the Asiatic Society, the Victoria Memorial, the Centre for Archaeological Studies, the Kolkata Museum of Modern Art and the Indian Anthropological Society. He took the lead in establishing the annual Kolkata Film Festival as an international event. He has published several articles and research papers on history, culture and society. In the last decade, he has focussed his research on specific aspects of popular culture, folk religion and on the development of socio-religious identities.

?NAction was taken against Lalli after the Shunglu committee report indicted him for irregularities in the broadcast contract of the Commonwealth Games. A Central Bureau of Investigation probe is underway in this connection. Meanwhile, a Supreme Court has been asked to probe the four charges of corruption established by the CVC.

The five allegations established by Central Vigilance Commission relate to contracts for management of advertisement revenue arising from the telecast of cricket matches on Doordarshan during 2007; the non-telecast by Doordarshan of T-20 cricket World Cup matches held in South Africa in September 2007; engagement of legal entities to represent Prasar Bharati; purchase of radio broadcasting rights for 13 cricket series held during 2007-09; and hiring of transport and accommodation for the conduct of the Commonwealth Youth Games in Pune in 2008.

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