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Monday to Sunday on both the afternoon prime time (12 noon to 2:30
pm) and evening prime time (8 pm to 10:30 pm) will be chock-a-block
with humour based shows, SABTNL vice-chairman and managing director
Markand Adhikari tells indiantelevision.com.
The switchover to only humour on prime time begins Monday, 5 May
with the launch of four new humor-based shows.
---Hassi Woh Phassi (a bi-weekly) - a comedy about
a dentist who can read the thoughts of any woman when she smiles.
It stars Shruti Ulfat, Seema Kapoor, Asif Basra and Suresh Menon.
 ---Sahib
Biwi Ke Gulaam (bi-weekly), a sitcom has the seasoned Shubhangi
Gokhale and Anjan Srivastava in the lead along with Deven Bhojani
(of Office Office fame) and Nivedita.
 ---Dhaaba
Junction (bi-weekly), based on two rival dhaabas (roadside eateries),
is the comeback vehicle for satirist Jaspal Bhatti, in a completely
new avtaar. Shot in a realistic 80-foot set at Film City, Mumbai,
the ambience of a real dhaaba has beren recreated for this show.
 ---Bade
Miyaa Chotte Miya (bi-weekly), a sitcom that has India's answer
to Jay Leno motormouth Shekhar Suman in a double-role for the first
time in a story about twins. There are also some serious rivalry
problems between the two since Twin "A" who was born exactly five
minutes before Twin "B" expects his younger brother to give him
his due, and which happens, but only in his imagination...
SAB has gone into overdrive on the brand promotion front as well
with a campaign that kicked off last Friday (18 April). The look
of the channel has changed and an extensive on air as well as outdoor
campaign seeks to reinforce the "Only Smiles, No Tears" proposition.
A teaser campaign in 14 cities across west and north India, including
Mumbai and Delhi, which began on 18 April is currently running on
hoardings, buses, trains and kiosks. In the Capital, where hoardings
are banned, 500 kiosks have been taken up.
From 1 May the campaign will translate into programme specific branding
and that will introduce the four new shows.
And what will all this achieve for the channel? Queried as to where
SAB TV would stand in a post-CAS scenario, Adhikari said if properly
implemented, it was bound to benefit his channel. The fact that
SAB TV was uniquely positioned as primarily a comedy channel would
make it a must carry not only on every cable platform but also on
every media plan as well, he asserts.
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To
mark its turning three years on air (23 April), SAB TV has gone
in for a new look and a new positioning. If SAB TV's selling proposition
to the viewer and the media planner last year was as a relief channel,
now this has been taken a step further and the Adhikaris have gone
the whole hog down the humour road. "Only Smiles, No Tears" is the
channel's new tag line while SAB TV's logo base line "sab se alag"
(different from everyone) reinforces the point. 