BBC gets permission to launch 2 channels in India

New Delhi, Mar 23: The British Broadcasting Corporation(BBC) will be making a foray into India's booming entertainment sector by launching two new TV channels soon.

An official in the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting told UNI that the permission for downlinking had been given to the BBC Worldwide, the commercial arm of Britain's public broadcaster, and all other technical formalities will take about a couple of months.

He said one channel will focus on entertainment and the other will be devoted to programmes for children.

BBC has a wholly-owned subsidiary in India 'BBC World India Pvt Ltd'.

By stepping into the area of kids' entertainment, BBC will be joining major international players like Walt Disney and Turner International who run channels like Disney, Cartoon Network etc.

During the past few years, the Indian broadcasting scene has evoked significant interest fron private players due to the boom in the media and entertainment Industry.

According to this year's FICCI-Price water house Coopers (PWC) report, the industry was poised to grow at an 18 per cent compound annual growth rate (CAGR) to reach Rs one trillion by 2011 from its present size of Rs 437 billion, an industry report said today.

The industry has been forecast to outperform the economic growth each year, till 2011.

''The growing demand coupled with technological advancements, policy initiatives taken by the Indian Government to encourage the inflow of investment and initiative by private media companies, will be the key drivers,'' said the 2007 annual edition of the report.

UNI