The Hindu : Prasar Bharati to pay royalty to musicians

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Aug 05, 2003

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Prasar Bharati to pay royalty to musicians

By Our Staff Reporter

HYDERABAD Aug. 4. Prasar Bharati has decided to pay royalty, likely from August 15, to artists such as lyricists, composers and publishers to encourage music, the Chief Executive Officer, K.S. Sarma, announced at a news conference here today.

The royalty would be paid through the Indian Performing Rights Society, a nodal agency, which would negotiate with Prasar Bharati on the rates, he said.

On its part, Prasar Bharati would study the rates being paid by other agencies before taking a decision.Mr. Sarma said that at present royalty was being paid by Prasar Bharati to phonogram producers at the rate of Rs.400 per 30 minutes as also by All-India Radio in case of western music for writers and composers.

An understanding had been reached with the Andhra Pradesh Government on the utilisation of Doordarshan's Saptagiri channel for four hours daily from August 15 to popularise the Government welfare and educational programmes, Mr. Sarma said. From 9.30 a.m. to 1.30 p.m., there would be eight half-hour slots, each fetching Prasar Bharati Rs. 4,000.

The State Government had agreed to invest Rs.10 crores in the Doordarsan/AIR set-up for utilising their channels following a request made by Mr. Sarma to the Chief Secretary.

S. Balasubramanyam, Director of Information and Public Relations, said the programmes would focus on welfare activities such as family welfare and AIDS control."We want to utilise DD Saptagiri for informative and educative purposes at a cost of Rs.10 crores. The department-wise allocation of funds is yet to be decided."

According to Mr. Sarma, Andhra Pradesh was the first State to commercially utilise the DD channels.Some States also had sought similar facilities. Prasar Bharati needed to take a uniform policy decision on this issue. It was also considering whether to charge for the Krishi Darshan and Grameena Darshan programmes.The State Government had agreed to pay Rs. 80 lakhs to Prasar Bharati for the coverage of the Godavari Pushkarams. The amount was to released by the month-end.

A similar coverage is likely for the Krishna Pushkarams next year.Referring to the Afro-Asian Games, Mr. Sarma said Doordarshan would not be able to show the closing ceremony on November 1 in view of an India/New Zealand/Australia tri-series cricket match in Mumbai.

The ceremony would, however, be telecast on DD's satellite channels.

Prasar Bharati had collected an "unprecedented" Rs. 81 crores worth of advertisements for the tri-series, he said.

The previous high was the Rs. 52 crores collected for the India-West Indies cricket series.

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