MUMBAI: 12 new channels have been added to the list of permitted private satellite TV channels in India after they received licence clearances from the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting (MIB). As of 31 August 2014, there are 810 channels in all as compared to 798 till 28 August 2014.

Of the 12 additions, one is a news channel and the rest are non-news. The total news and current affairs channels in the country are now 398 and non-news and current affairs are 412.

The new channels that have received clearances include Blue, ESPN, ESPN HD, Star Sports Highlights, Star Cricket Asia, Janam and Green TV.

Meanwhile, existing channels Star Sports 1, Star Sports 2, Star Sports 3 and Star Sports 4 have got permission for languages English, Hindi, Assamese, Bengali, Bodo, Dogri, Gujarati, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Maithili, Malayalam, Manipuri, Marathi, Nepali, Sanskrit, Santhali, Sindhi, Tamil, Telugu, Urdu and any other language as permitted under the Constitution of India.

Star Sports HD1 and Star Sports HD2 have got permission for languages English, Hindi, Assamese, Bengali, Bodo and Dogri. New channels under Star India that got permission- ESPN, ESPN HD, Star Sports Highlights and Star Cricket Asia also have permission for all the above languages.

The number of TV channels permitted for uplink from and downlink to India has increased from 671 to 682 with 376 (earlier 375) news and 306 (earlier 296) non-news channels. The number of channels permitted for uplink from India has increased from 34 to 35 with six news and 29 (earlier 28) non-news channels.

TV channels that can only downlink in India stayed constant at 93 with 16 news and 77 non-news channels.