There was a lot of criticism that your bid for kiosks was on the higher side. There are rumours that you are going to make huge losses. What do you have to say?
Yes, we were criticised by several "so-called" industry experts who claimed that that our bid was high and unrealistic. Considering the flow of revenues and business generated, it looks as if we have miscalculated. We have not received the kind of revenues that we expected during the first few months. We are lagging behind in terms of targets.

However, the younger generation (of the Mittle family) have taken it as a challenge and are trying their level best to ensure that we turn this investment into a profitable one within the next three years.

Having being involved with the medium of radio since so many years, how do you view the current developments?
Radio hasn't been exploited to the extent to which it should have been. Agencies must realise that people will come back to radio in fiscal 2003-4. The FM sector has seen a revival of sorts but Vividh Bharati is still not getting it's due. The mainline media executives don't realise the significance of Vividh Bharati as a medium.

In the private sector, most of the big media houses - The Times group, Mid-Day, Living Media and Star India - will be able to support their FM radio station ventures. Independent players such as WIN will suffer due to insufficient backing in the long run. However, most of the FM radio channels sound the same - haven't been able to differentiate themselves much from each other. They sound like clones.

Consider some programmes on Vividh Bharati still have a piece of our mind space - Bhule Bisre Geet or Chitralok on Vividh Bharati still evoke some kind of a nostalgia that today's programmes don't. The government must however take steps to reduce licence fees and the radio channels must cut down on advertising rates. Actually, the same situation that prevails in the outdoor medium will eventually occur in the radio business.

Are there any major developments in the railway advertising segment?
Railways hoardings contribute to our group turnover in a major way. At present, we are concentrating on western and central railways in Mumbai. Earlier, we had exposure to different stations across the country but we had stopped it some years back. There is news that there is some internal change within the railway departments - IRCTS will oversee the bids and we shall be making presentations to the concerned officials.

What kind of activities have been planned by the new RAPA council 2003?
The newly appointed RAPA council for 2003 has charted out a series of interesting programmes for the year ahead. We plan to do three workshops on animation, writing and voice-overs. We are also planning to conduct a workshop on AIR (All India Radio) and plan to invite all the constituents including the producers, government officials and advertisers.

This seminar will focus on the primary channel Vividh Bharati - which we feel is ignored - FM and other aspects such as policies. In the first quarter of the year, we also organised an exciting ghazal evening with Padma Bhushan Jagjit Singh in Mumbai's Tulip Star Hotel as a fund-raising event. We got a good response and this will surely boost RAPA welfare fund for the fraternity.

And of course, RAPA annual awards will surely be a high point for us. Much more is expected to follow and the underlying theme is "Josh". We are getting a lot of support from all quarters and the mutual inspiration and constant interaction is paying rich dividends.

What were the new categories added this year for the RAPA awards?
All the radio and TV entries produced in India and broadcast or telecast for the first time, in any part of the world, between 1 January 2002 and 31 December 2002, are eligible to compete. Telecast criteria not applicable for documentaries.

However all submitted documentaries must have been produced in the calendar year 2002. This year, we have added new categories such as "best ad campaign on radio", "best direction in a telefilm" and "best live coverage of events on TV".

We always conduct a survey and obtain feedback from industry stalwarts and the decision to increase the number of categories has been taken on the basis of the feedback received. Usually, the producers are the centre of attraction, but this year, we decided to bring the technicians and other support crew to the fore by honouring them.

The RAPA awards are one-of-a kind as they honour excellence in all the languages other than Hindi and English. The languages include: Assamese, Bengali, Dongri, English, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Kashmiri, Konkani, Malayalam, Marathi, Nepali, Oriya, Punjabi, Tamil, Telugu and Urdu. An entrant can send any number of entries.

We started taking entries in Kashmiri and Dogri since year before last. We have got a very good response even for Urdu.

We were very strict about ensuring that the nomination formats were strictly adhered to. The last date of entries was 28 March but we accepted entries that reached a week later. However, entries were still flowing in till mid-April. We didn't consider many of these late entrants as the screening process and scrutiny had already started.

This year, the number of entries from Doordarshan upcountry affiliate producers - an example would be DD Rajkot - has increased. The number of entries from DD Mumbai has also increased. The quality has also increased. For instance, Living Media's Aaj Tak channel's documentary Rameshwaram to Rashtrapati Bhavan was simply brilliant. Also, we have tried to broaden the scope of "live events" by not restricting them to news channels. The quality of radio programmes has also improved tremendously.

What about the guests and special invitees for RAPA awards?
This year, we plan to restrict the number of invited guests to around 600 people. This is the kind of numbers that the venue in Mumbai's Taj Land's End can accommodate. However, we have already sent invitations to the important people from the fraternity.

In fact, we have approached important dignitaries such as the national I&B minister RS Prasad, Maharashtra chief minister and deputy chief minister; and asked them to grace the occasion. We have extended invitations to the bureaucrats who hold important posts in Prasar Bharati, DD and AIR. We have also informed the artistes and many of them including Pallavi Joshi, Poonam Dhillon, Jackie Shroff, Jeetendra and Ektaa Kapoor have confirmed. Suniel Shetty told me that he will come if he is in town. Of course, the artistes who are RAPA members will definitely be there.

Since the last year, we have started this practise of informing winners in advance so that they can grace the occasion with their presence. It would also enable the representatives of the winning companies to alter their schedules accordingly and make it a point to be present.