MUMBAI: Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa, the celebrity dancing reality show, which will have its fifth season aired on Colors, is expected to earn ad revenues in the region of Rs 400-450 million.

JDJ, which was a weekday property on Sony Entertainment Television (Set) last year, will be aired in the weekends on Colors.

Starting 16 June, the Viacom18 channel will air the 27-episodic series every Saturday and Sunday at 9 pm. The show had opened with a 4.5 TVR last year on Set and had averaged around 3 TVR. As per industry sources, Set had made Rs 350 million from the show.

Colors has roped in Cadbury Bournvita as the presenting sponsor while the show is powered by Streax Hair Colour. Colors is planning to lock in six associate sponsors out of which four are already on board and rest two are in the final stages of the deal. The associate sponsors already on board are- Tata Magic Iris, Samsung Mobile, Parryware, and Johnson & Johnson’s Clean & Clear.

According to market estimates, the title sponsor has paid Rs 100-120 million, while powered by has shelled out Rs 60-70 million. The associate sponsors have invested around Rs 30-40 million in the show.

“20-30 per cent of the ad inventory is left to be sold out,” revealed a source from the channel.

When asked if the advertisers are pulling themselves back because of the slowdown, Colors CEO Raj Nayak said, “The inventory is going full; we aren’t seeing any effect of the slowdown. The show is getting tremendous response and hopefully we will get some more sponsors by the time we go on air.”

OMD, the integrated communications agency, delivering media and marketing solutions, is handling associate sponsors Parryware and Johnson & Johnson’s Clean & Clear as clients.

The channel is aggressively promoting the show on every possible platform. It is considering social media as a very important medium for engaging audiences and will be doing SMO (Search Media Optimisation) activities with Google and YouTube.

The channel is spending around Rs 60-70 million on promoting the show. Apart from Viacom18’s own network, Colors has booked over 3000 TV spots across 30 television channels. It has also bought over 7000 radio spots on radio channels across the country to promote the show. There will be more than 100 print advertisements and over 500 OOH sites in more than 20 cities across India.

Colors marketing head Rajesh Iyer said, “It’s an important show for us, so we are going all out to promote it. We are hopeful that the show will get a good opening.”

The channel is doing malls activations in 10 cities and also promoting the show in the rural markets. It will create a roadblock on Radio Mirchi on the day of launch and air songs sung by the judges. Throughout the day there will be only dance numbers branded as “JDJ shut up and dance”. Over 100 dance numbers will be played during the course of the day. When the RJ is speaking one of the judges or contestants will interrupt and ask them to shut up and dance, the channel said.

Colors is placing the show in the weekend slot because the channel thinks that it is already doing well in the weekday primetime bands and the dance reality show could strengthen its weekend programming.

“We already have a strong weekday lineup which garners good numbers and now with Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa, we are looking forward to further strengthen our position over the weekend,” Nayak said.

The show will be competing with slot leader Zee TV’s DID Lil Masters and Star Plus’ Jo Jeeta Wohi Superstar on Saturday and Sunday. It will also compete will Sony’ Indian Idol on Saturday.

“At any given point of time, irrespective of any slot, on any day we are competing with all the television players. For us this slot is no different than any other slot. We launch a programme because we believe in it and we have a conviction. I think this year we have managed to get the right mix of contestants and right profile of judges," Nayak averred.

Colors weekend programming head Manisha Sharma said, “This season of Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa, is all about ‘stepping out’ from the routine and nurturing the passion for dance. Some of the best feet have come walking into our show to connect with the audiences on a different level – introducing the person behind the real star. With the trinity of judges – Madhuri Dixit-Nene, Karan Johar, and Remo D’souza – on board to mentor and encourage the contestants, audiences will be able to catch their favourite celebrities shed their inhibitions and dance with their hearts to provide unlimited entertainment.”

Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa is an Indian version of the international format 'Dancing with the Stars'. It was produced by BBC Worldwide Entertainment.

Talking about the shift of the show from Sony to Colors, BBC Worldwide Productions India general manager and creative head Myleeta Aga said, “Sony was reworking on its non-fiction line up and we were keen to keep Jhalak on-air. Colors expressed great interest and commitment with the format. The channel has a network behind it; they believe in non-fiction, in this format and they have really brought in a certain level of celebrities to the cast which is something very critical for the show on air.”

This season of Jhalak Dikhhla Ja will witness some ‘never-seen-before’ themes that will raise the entertainment quotient. With concepts like dancing to a live band, paying tribute to 100 years of Indian cinema, and getting paired up for performances with international ‘Dancing with the Stars’ winners, Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa is going all out with the theme ‘Step Out’ of the ordinary, the channel said.

The special inclusion this season is ‘Madhuri Dixit’s Step of the Week’ where she will groove to international dance forms including cha-cha-cha, salsa, samba.

“The new season of Jhalak Dikhhla Jaa will be extensively remodelled from the international version to appeal to the country’s viewers. Not only will the dances be more exuberant than on its sister programmes around the world, but will also feature India’s cultural breadth and depth through different dance forms," Aga added.

The show will be hosted by Manish Paul and Ragini Khanna. The contestants are – Sanath Jayasuriya (with choreographer Suchitra), Darsheel Safari (with Avneet Kaur), Ravi Kishan (with Kunjan), Talat Aziz (with Ankita Maity), Pratyusha Banerjee (with Deepak), Giaa Manek (with Nishant Bhat), Gurmeet Choudhary (with Shampa Sonathalia), Bharti Singh (with Savio Barnes), Isha Sharvani (with Salman), Shibani Dandekar (with Punit), Archna Vijaya (with Sanam Johar) and Jayati Bhatia (with Diwakar).

The 13th contestant will also enter the show on the launch day. Though the channel has not revealed the identity of the contestant, it said that it will be a known face.