MUMBAI: Catching the signals of a strong rebound in the Indian economy, Sun TV Network has decided to increase its advertising rates just five quarters after its earlier revision.

The Kalanithi Maran-owned South Indian media conglomerate, which had increased it advertising rates starting 1 January last year (after a gap of almost two years), has announced a further 8-32 per cent hike across its Tamil channels.

Effective 1 April, flagship channel Sun TV and the other Tamil channels - KTV, Sun Music, Sun News, Chutti and Adhitya - will hike their ad rates.

“The effective ad rate hike will be 15 per cent across the Tamil market. Tamil Nadu contributes 45 per cent of Sun Network’s total ad revenues. Sun will continue to maintain a healthy ad growth in the next fiscal, both from volumes and from the rate hike,” says a market source.

The rate hike will be effective across the slot fees (broadcast fees) received from content producers.

Sun TV Network will also announce soon ad rate hike across the other three south markets. Sun has 14 channels in these three language markets including Gemini (Telugu), Udaya (Kannada) and Surya (Malayalam).

The overall effective ad rate hike across the four markets would be in the region of 13-15 per cent, according to market estimates.

Sun had last revised its ad rates across its channels between 10-33 per cent from January 2010. This resulted in an effective hike of 13 per cent, according to market estimates.

For the first nine-month period ended December, Sun reported a total income of Rs 14.93 billion, up 43.93 per cent from the year-ago period.

Shares of Sun TV closed Tuesday at Rs 409.65, down marginally by 0.24 per cent in a bearish market, as it recovered after Monday‘s 11 per cent tumble due to rumours of CBI investigation on alleged links with Kalaignar TV, which was reported to have received Rs 2.14 billion as loan from DB Realty. The stock touched an intraday high of Rs 433.15 and a low of Rs 402.05 on the BSE.