(17 June 2008 7:30 pm)

MUMBAI: Direct-to-home (DTH) service provider with the help of Indian satellites will alert state agencies and the public about imminent natural disasters, announced the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) official.

“In the next six months, Doordarshan will relay warning signals from Insat transponders in Ku-band on impending disasters through a DTH receiver linked to the national disaster management support system in New Delhi,” ISRO chairman G. Madhavan Nair told IANS.

“As against expensive and heavy equipment consisting of an antenna, power supply system and a TV booster, we have developed a lighter DTH receiver that can be hooked to a TV set for receiving advance warning through voice or signals even while watching any channel,” avers Nair.

The project will be launched on a pilot basis by this year-end using Doordarshan's DTH platform. Private DTH operators such as Tata Sky, Dish TV, Sun TV and others will subsequently be roped in to offer the service on their platform as they are also using ISRO's Ku-band transponders to telecast their bouquet of channels.