NEW I&B MINISTER TALKS TOUGH ON CINEMA

Newly appointed information & broadcasting minister Pramod Mahajan made his first pronouncements last week. He said that Indians had a basic right to information and that his ministry would put in its best efforts to create an atmosphere in which correct information is reached to Indian citizens.

Mahajan added that the government was in favour of Indian films portraying reality, but it would step in if any "film or artistic work encouraged tendencies of sex and violence." He opined that the government would go all out to promote Indian cinema as an important foreign exchange earner for India.

STAR PLUS GENERATES HIGH VIEWER RATINGS

Star Plus generated unheard-of-viewer ratings for the telecast of blockbuster Hindi movies in November. Viewer data by industry ratings service TAM reveal that Pardes telecast on the channel on 14 November notched up a viewer rating of 13.3, while Ghulam had a rating of 16.4 in Mumbai city. The two films scored rating figures of 8.2 and 10.7 for the eight city all India average. The channel is slated to air other box office successes like Satya and Coolie No 1 during December before laying off big Bollywood fare in January. The channel has been waging a war with Sony Entertainment to pocket telecast rights to the most successful new Hindi film releases and has paid up to Rs 7 million for one title.

PRASAR BHARATI CORP STAFF STRIKE WORK

Some 12,000 employees of the Prasar Bharati - the holding company of state-owned telecaster Doordarshan and radiocaster All India Radio - struck work last week seeking better salaries. The three day strike was called off when new I&B minister Pramod Mahajan promised to look into their grievances and asked for some time to study their demands as he had just taken over his ministry.

ARIANESPACE & ISRO: NEW PLANS

European space firm Arianespace, which last April agreed with the Indian Space Research Organisation (Isro) to jointly bid for micro-satellite launch contracts, says it is looking at extending that agreement to include medium-sized satellites. The earlier agreement covered joint launches by the two using the Isro-designed Polar Satellite Launch Vehicle (PSLV). Isro is currently developing the Geostationary Launch Vehicle (GSLV) which will be used to launch medium-sized satellites like the Insat series.

ISPAT SATELLITE TELEPHONY PROJECT GETS GOVERNMENT NOD

The Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) has green signaled the global satellite telephony project proposed by the multibillion dollar Ispat group for the second time. The project envisages a foreign direct investment of Rs 6,750 million and was cleared by the FIPB last month. It was, however, sent back to the board for technical details. The project will now have to seek clearance from the Cabinet Committee on Foreign Investment.

CNBC ASIA: SEARCH FOR COMPLETE INDIAN MANAGER

CNBC Asia is conducting the complete manager contest, covering 60 Indian business schools in 13 cities. Under this business management degree students are being put through a rigor of tests including written questions, rapid fire quizzes, self-introductions, business situation analysis, to see if they possess these among other managerial skills. It is being held first at the management institute level, the regional level and finally at the national level to select a student as the most complete Indian manager. The national final will be held on 8 January 1999 in Delhi.

SITICABLE AND INCABLENET GET ISP LICENCES

Multi-system operators InCablenet and Siticable have been issued national licences to offer Internet services using their cable TV networks. While Siticable is slated to commence services in the next three months in Delhi and Mumbai, InCableNet will introduce its Internet service on its Mumbai network first.

MIP INTERACTIVE GETS HYPERACTIVE

The Reed Midem Organization-promoted online market Mip Interactive is being promoted aggressively. At the recently concluded MIP Asia '98 exhibition in Singapore, the service signed on "several subscribers." The site which is located at www.mipinteractive.com lists program buyers, distributors, and television channels, across the world with easy to use search tools in the database. Mip Interactive hopes to list 500 key program buyers by end 1998 on its site and had already signed on 160 distributors and 320 key buyers in early December.

VATSA GROUP TO LAUNCH CHANNEL

The controversy-ridden Vatsa Finance group has announced that it is going to launch a four-hour Hindi music channel by early next month. The free to air analogue channel is called Vatsa Television Network (VTN) and will be uplinked from Thailand. The group's is reported to have a not-so-good reputation and its activities in India have been under investigation by the Indian authorities.