होम / टीवी / फ्री टू एयर चैनल्स की तरफ से उठी ये मांग, सूचना प्रसारण मंत्री को लिखा पत्र

फ्री टू एयर चैनल्स की तरफ से उठी ये मांग, सूचना प्रसारण मंत्री को लिखा पत्र

फ्री टू एयर (Free To Air) चैनल के कंसोर्टियम (संघ) ने केंद्रीय सूचना प्रसारण मंत्री प्रकाश जावड़ेकर को पत्र लिखकर उनके समक्ष कई मांग रखी हैं

समाचार4मीडिया ब्यूरो 4 years ago

फ्री टू एयर (Free To Air) चैनल के कंसोर्टियम (संघ) ने केंद्रीय सूचना प्रसारण मंत्री प्रकाश जावड़ेकर को पत्र लिखकऱ अपने चैनल्स को प्रसार भारती के डीटीएच प्लेटफॉर्म ‘डीडी फ्रीडिश’ (DD Free Dish) पर जगह देने की मांग की है। इस बारे में कंसोर्टियम ने एक पत्र भी लिखा है। दरअसल, कोरोनावायरस (कोविड-19) के कारण चैनल्स के रेवेन्यू में काफी गिरावट आ रही है।  इसी के मद्देनजर यह पत्र लिखा गया है।

पत्र के अनुसार, इस महामारी ने देश की अर्थव्यवस्था पर काफी विपरीत असर डाला है। कोरोनावायरस के संक्रमण को फैलने से रोकने के लिए देश में किए गए लॉकडाउन के कारण तमाम सेक्टर्स आर्थिक संकट का सामना कर रहे हैं। इनमें मीडिया और एंटरटेनमेंट सेक्टर भी शामिल है। इस सेक्टर को मिलने वाले एडवर्टाइजिंग में काफी कमी आई है।   

इस पत्र में कहा गया है, ‘महामारी के इस दौर में भी हम अपने व्युअर्स को लगातार कंटेंट उपलब्ध करा रहे हैं और इसके लिए हमारी टीम लगातार काम कर रही हैं। बिजनेस पर पड़ रहे इस विपरीत प्रभाव और हमारे रेवेन्यू में कमी को देखते हुए हमारे प्रति बहुत ही सहानुभूति पूर्वक विचार किए जाने की जरूरत है। कुछ ऐसे चैनल्स भी हैं जो कुछ समय पहले ही लॉन्च हुए हैं और वे रेवेन्यू की कमी से जूझ रहे हैं।’ कंसोर्टियम द्वारा केंद्रीय मंत्री प्रकाश जावड़ेकर को लिखे गए पत्र को आप यहां पढ़ सकते हैं।

Sir, as we all know the COVID-19 pandemic has adversely impacted the Indian economy. All sectors of the economy are reeling from the impact of the nationwide lockdown, including media and entertainment. Advertisement bookings have nosedived by 80%. Commercial advertisements are the sole revenue stream for Free-to-Air channels to support all its costs of Content, Operations, Carriage, Marketing and Transmission and in the current scenario, we have been struggling to deal with a steep de-growth and the biggest impact is on advertising revenues that is likely to see a 70-80% pullback.

In line with Government’s vision of making best of entertainment accessible freely to all socio economical class of Indian population through the DD Free Dish platform, all the Free-to-Air channels play a very important role especially for the poorer sections of our society and thus it’s commercial viability & sustainability must be taken into consideration.

We would also like to take this opportunity to thank the Government of India for inclusion of “Electronic Media”, which reaches the length and breadth of the nation as one of the “Essential Services” during the lock down period. We intend to continue reaching out to our millions of viewers on a daily basis and for which our teams are working tirelessly.

Sir, as early as end of March, we all in our individual capacities had reached out to DD Free Dish with a certain request of waving carriage fees for a quarter (April, May and June) owed by us to them in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic.

In response of which we were in receipt of letter dated April 7, 2020 offering a deferred payment schedule in lieu of the waiver of 3 months’ outstanding payments sought for, and that too with a provision for furnishing a bank guarantee (valid upto 31.07.2020) of equivalent amount. Availing the said relief has been subjected to interest levy at 5.7% per annum and GST on the interest amount.

Sir, the aforesaid relief would not serve the purpose at this juncture, but instead put additional hardships on the Company in terms of bank guarantee charges, interest payments and GST amounts with effectively no relief on the total carriage fee payments.

In light of the current adverse business environment, our request requires a lot more sympathetic consideration, considering our revenues have been eroded. There are few channels which have been recently launched on 01.04.2020 and they are facing the brunt with no revenues at all.

As responsible corporate citizens of this nation, upon the request of our Hon’ble Prime Minister it has become our foremost duty to pay all our salaries on time which in turn will ensure that livelihood of hundreds of people. We wish to draw your attention once again to the fact that with business coming down to 10-15% of normal monthly business, we will be only in a position to disburse salaries and any more expense burden in the current & coming months will affect our salary paying capacity in such marginalised incomes.

We, therefore, humbly place our request in front of your kind self which is a waiver of 100% Carriage Fees due to PrasarBharati for first quarter (April, May and June) and 50% for second quarter i.e. (July, August and September) for Channels who have secured MPEG-2 slots on Prasar Bharati’s Free Dish Platform during the recently held 44th E-auction.

We base our request post understanding the time that the entire industry would need for normalcy to return.

In view of the facts furnished above, we all would appreciate your personal intervention in this matter so that broadcasting sector as a whole tides over the current situation.
 

 

टैग्स प्रकाश जावड़ेकर डीडी फ्रीडिश कोविड-19 कोरोनावायरस एफटीए चैनल्स फ्री टू एयर चैनल्स