New Indian TV channel on lines of BBC, CNN mooted

New Delhi, June 20 (UNI) In an ambitious move to put the country on the world media map, the government is actively considering a proposal for launching a global current affairs and news channel ''with Indian perspective''.

The channel was most likely to be indepedent of public broadcsater Prasar Bharati and managed by a trust or company to be specially created for the purpose.

''Various options are being considered, but no decision about what kind of agency will run the channel has been taken,'' a senior official of the Ministry told UNI.

The international channel will be on the lines of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) or the CNN, he said.

The idea behind having this kind of channel is to find in the global information space a place for the country in accordance with the political and economic power it wields, some members of the Committee which has passed the proposal, told UNI.

''So far we have only CNN and BBC which are international media players, but that too in the northern hemisphere. There should be some platform in the southern hemisphere too that could provide credible news about countries of the region,'' said a member of the committee.

The new channel will fill the gap left by the existing private channels in the country which mostly concentrated only on the very local, said one of them.

They said the proposal had been forwarded to the Prime Minister by the Information and Broadcasting Ministry Secretary, who chaired the meeting of the committee at which it was cleared.

The venture would require massive funds, which Prasar Bhararti was incapable of generating. So the public Broadcaster may either be a partner or just be kept out of the venture.

One member of the committee said that getting private funding the for the venture will not be a problem, but private partcipation will be allowed on the condition of non-interference in the news coverage and content.

The channel, if cleared, will have a separate studio and staff and will be independent of government control.

UNI NAZ LR KP1737