A consortium of Free To Air (FTA) channels has appealed to the Information and Broadcasting Ministry to have their channels placed on Prasar Bharati’s DTH platform DD Free Dish.

As the advertising revenue has fallen over 80 per cent, FTA channels have been struggling to stay afloat. In a letter to Prakash Javadekar, I&B Minister, the consortium has said that commercial advertisements are the sole revenue stream for FTA to support its costs of content, operations, carriage, marketing and transmission.

The letter says that the channels are struggling to deal with the steep de-growth, and that the commercial viability and sustainability of FTA channels needs to be taken into consideration, especially with the government's vision of making entertainment freely accessible to all socio-economical classes through the DD Free Dish platform.

The communiqué goes on to say the FTA channels had also reached out in their individual capacity as early as the end of March, to request DD Free Dish to waive carriage fees for a quarter (April, May and June) owed by them, in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Govt’s relief is not enough

Noting that a letter was received offering a deferred payment schedule — in lieu of the waiver of three months outstanding payments sought for — the consortium says the relief granted by the government would not serve the purpose, and would instead put additional hurdles in their path.

The letter further highlights the plight of few channels recently launched on April 1, 2020, which have been facing the brunt with no revenues.

Given the adverse business environment, and with revenues eroded, the letter has asked for a waiver of 100 per cent carriage fees due to Prasar Bharati for the first quarter (April, May and June) and 50 per cent for the second quarter (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.

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