NEW DELHI: The Group of Ministers on Prasar Bharati has recommended that the dues from the pubcaster amounting to over Rs 13 billion on account of space segment and spectrum charges as on 31 March 2011 be waived.

Even as it has commenced arbitration proceedings to recover dues from production houses or advertising agencies, Prasar Bharati itself owed a total amount of Rs 13.05 billion as on 31 March to various Ministries and Departments, Prasar Bharati sources told indiantelevision.com.

While All India Radio owed Rs 2.11 billion, Doordarshan owed Rs 10.94 billion on account of space segment and spectrum charges.

DD and AIR have to pay Rs 6.47 billion and Rs 1.77 billion as space segment charges respectively.

On the spectrum front, DD and AIR owe Rs 4.47 billion and Rs 324 million.

NEW DELHI: The Parliament was informed today that a case has been registered against the former chief executive officer of Prasar Bharati BS Lalli and a private individual in the case of award of contract by Prasar Bharati to a private company for telecast of the Commonwealth Games last year.

Sports Minister Ajay Maken said today that the case was filed on the basis of the reports filed by the High Level Committee on the Commonwealth Games headed by VK Shunglu.

The Minister also stated that a new Group of Ministers (GoM) has been constituted to examine the replies/comments of the various Ministries/Departments/Government and other executing agencies furnished by them on the observations/ recommendations of the High Level Committee.

A GoM has considered the observations made by the Committee regarding the relationship between the Government and Prasar Bharati and the former CEO and the Prasar Bharati Board.

The Information and Broadcasting Ministry has already done a comprehensive review of the provisions of the Prasar Bharati Act and has recommended certain amendments to the Act.

NEW DELHI: Prasar Bharati has posted a 19.14 per cent jump in revenue to Rs 13.88 billion for the financial year ended March 2011, according to the pubcaster?s sources.

The accounts have not been finally audited for the fiscal in view of various factors including the Commonwealth Games broadcast rights issue.

"The figures reported by the Directorates of All India Radio and Doordarshan add up to a revenue of Rs 13.88 for the fiscal ended March 2011. The final audit has not been done due to various factors including the CWG broadcast rights issue," the sources add.

In FY?10, Prasar Bharati had reported revenue of Rs 11.65 billion.

The operational cost of Doordarshan, however, has climbed to Rs 14.69 billion in 2010-11, compared with Rs 14.21 billion in the year-ago period.

The operational cost includes non-plan expenditure, revenue expenditure, and capital plan expenditure. The rise has been mainly due to increase in salary, dearness allowance and grant of benefit of Modified Assured Career Progression Scheme to the employees.

Earlier this year, the Group of Ministers recommended that the Government should meet 100 per cent of the expenses on salaries and allowances of the employees and augmentation/replacement of capital assets.

The remaining items of operating expenditure are to be borne by Prasar Bharati from its revenue earnings.

A total of 8018 personnel would be required for the operation and maintenance of newly sanctioned projects of All India Radio (2183) and Doordarshan (5835), according to sources. This is in addition to 3452 posts lying vacant and considered by Prasar Bharati as priority.

The Group of Ministers has approved a scheme worked out with the Finance Ministry for this purpose.

Earlier this year, the Prasar Bharati Board considered the long-pending Recruitment Rules for 196 cadres of employees in Prasar Bharati for forwarding to Government. Non-existence of these rules ever since Prasar Bharati came into being in 1997 was a major reason for the huge backlog in filling up the vacancies and making vital appointments, something which has come under heavy criticism in Parliamentary Committees.

NEW DELHI: All India Radio (AIR) has posted revenue of Rs 2.94 billion for the fiscal ended March 2011, up 18.35 per cent from Rs 2.49 billion in the year-ago period.

This includes the commercial revenue of the AIR AM/FM channels and also the revenues earned directly by Prasar Bharati towards publicity campaigns of different government departments and ministries.

AIR has earned revenue of Rs 364.47 million till May this financial year.

The Government earned revenue of approximately Rs 17.48 billion till 31 July 2011 from Phase I and Phase II of FM radio. Out of this, the Government earned around Rs 1.78 billion over the last three years from 2008-09 up to 31 July this year.

Apart from the revenues from the open auction procedure for Phase III of FM, the government is expected to also earn substantial income from beaming news of AIR on ‘as is where is‘ basis.

A total of 245 private FM and 252 AM/FM channels of AIR are operational in the country.

NEW DELHI: Even as it blames Prasar Bharati for favouring the British firm SIS Live in the bidding for the Commonwealth Games broadcasting deal, the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) says that the Information and Broadcasting Ministry delayed the tender process and left no options except to agree with the pubcaster‘s recommendations.

The CAG in its report on the Commonwealth Games with a full chapter on broadcasting also says Prasar Bharati amended the draft contract to allow SIS Live to "outsource almost the entire contract on the same day" to Indian firm Zoom Communications. SIS Live had been awarded the Rs 2.46 billion broadcasting contract.

In many ways, the CAG report supports most of the allegations framed by the V.K. Shunglu Committee appointed by the Prime Minister. However, the CAG report does not name then-Prasar Bharati CEO BS Lalli and former Doordarshan Director-General Aruna Sharma for causing a loss of Rs 1.35 billion as Shunglu had done. The report has, instead, pointed the finger at the Ministry and the pubcaster as a whole.
 
CAG in its section on the Media and Broadcasting Services says the award of the contract was flawed on several grounds.

"Lack of competition was facilitated by a rigid stand taken by Prasar Bharati at the stage of bidding, which restricted potential competitors, leaving only one ‘chosen‘ bidder," says the report. However, after SIS Live won the deal by virtue of being the sole bidder, the pubcaster amended the contract to "make it one-sided in favour of the SIS Live." Among the important amendments include the change of payment schedule, allowing a pre-Games payment of 60 per cent instead of 40 per cent of the contract.

The draft contract was amended to allow SIS Live to use "sub-contractors" such as Zoom Communications which went on to do the bulk of the work, but would not have been eligible to bid for the contract itself. The CAG report says this meant SIS Live was "acting essentially as a conduit" enabling the "back-door entry of Zoom".

The CAG also blames the oversight team, noting that the host broadcast management committee was marred by conflicts of opinion. "Of the 40 meetings for which minutes are available, only two are signed by all members. Objections to contract amendments were ignored."

Both I&B Minister Ambika Soni and Law Minister Veerappa Moily, who chaired the Oversight Committee together, did intervene, saying that changing the payment schedule should be re-considered. However, their intervention "did not have any lasting effect", notes the CAG.

I&B Ministry secretary Raghu Menon has admitted in a letter to the CAG that this was largely due to lack of time. The Ministry was "left with no alternative but to accede to the demands (of SIS Live), since non-telecast would be a matter of international embarrassment," says the report.

The CAG‘s report on the autonomous body also blames it for causing the loss of revenue of Rs 18 million by not allotting two vacant slots of its DTH platform despite 38 pending requests.

Menon wrote: "Given the circumstances and the fact that there is no time to initiate fresh process, the Ministry does not have the option of revisiting the issue." The secretary also mentioned that then Cabinet Secretary K M Chandrasekhar wanted the telecast to be ensured.

Soni at an Oversight Committee meeting constituted to provide policy direction on telecast issues, felt that changing the payment schedule can open legal intervention by other parties and said some parties chose to opt out of the bidding process because of the terms and conditions of the payment schedule.

In the same meeting, the CAG says, Moily felt the opinion of solicitor general Gopal Subramanium had not specifically given a finding on legality of changing the payment condition, which Soni said Subramanium should have done rather than leaving the decision to competent authority.

NEW DELHI: The Information and Broadcasting Ministry and the Prasar Bharati have made some recommendations to the Prasar Bharati (Broadcasting Corporation of India) Act 1990 about the relationship between the Government and the pubcaster and between its Board and the chief executive officer.

This follows consideration by a Group of Ministers of the recommendations of a high level committee headed by V K Shunglu relating to broadcasting rights for the Commonwealth Games last year.
 
The Prasar Bharati Board and the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting has done a compressive review of the provisions of the Prasar Bharati Act, sources told indiantelevision.com.