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STAR TV & ZEE TV:
RESTRUCTURING TIME?
The buzz doing the rounds at Star TV
and Zee TV is that both are going to chop and change
their organisational structure soon. In Star TV's case,
exiting chief Gary Davey and chairman Gareth Chang were
to meet in a series of get-togethers with senior local
staff in Delhi and Mumbai wishing Davey a fond farewell
from Star TV to Australia. Chang also visited the new
information and broadcasting minister Arun Jaitley.
Chang told a local daily that the plan
is to put a separate programming team in place for the
launch of a full-fledged Hindi channel and other regional
language services. But the network will not be pumping
in any additional funding into its India operations
until a Broadcasting Bill is passed, he said.
Executives are waiting to see what changes
that Bruce Churchill (who has been doubling up for Gary
Davey), current India CEO Peter Mukerjea and Chang may
look at bringing in.
The message that has been reverberating
through the company is that a management shakeup is
on the anvil which will result in a further streamlining
of operations and hence a stronger bottomline for News
Television (India). Already quite a few executives have
been shunted around in the Star TV Network from positions
in the DTH venture, ISKyB.
This is in preparation for the bruising
war that is expected to take place between it and Zee
TV as it goes about increasing local content on Star
Plus and its other channels.
The message at Zee TV is the same. With
managing director and CEO Vijay Jindal to move to Bangalore
to manage the Internet project he has co-promoted with
Subhash Chandra, the reins are increasingly being passed
on to incoming CEO R.K. Singh who was earlier with ESPN
& Star Sports and before that with DD. Singh has started
the process of reviewing the manpower requirement at
Zee Telefilms at the senior level. This people say is
a precursor to laying off or shuffling some senior deadwood
managers into new businesses, should they not measure
up to Chandra's and Singh's demanding requirements.
Zee TV was the scene of a similar massacre
three years ago when Jindal joined the company. He had
been brought in to break the informal power centres
that had formed within Zee Telefilms from the time it
was created. Senior executives such as Meenakshi Madhvani,
Digvijay Singh, Karuna Samtani who were at that well-ensconced
in their jobs were politely - and not so politely -
eased out.
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