MUMBAI: All India Radio (AIR) is adopting news as a strategy to expand its audience base on FM Rainbow radio channels. Private operators, in contrast, are not allowed to broadcast news.

FM Rainbow (earlier called AIR FM I) has decided to progressively increase its news content while retaining the brief two-minute format.

Starting today, FM Rainbow has expanded the local language news exposure in five cities. While the frequency has been augmented to 18 times in Kolkata (which used to play news once) and Chennai (twice a day), in Mumbai has gone up to 15 times a day (earlier once). FM Rainbow in Panaji (Goa) and Hyderabad will air news across ten and seven time zones respectively.

The news service was launched in Tiruchirapalli (Tamil Nadu) and Cuttack (Orissa) today. While Tiruchirapalli will play it on seven occasions, Cuttack will have it six times a day.

"With the two-minute local language news format, we are targeting audiences in the age group of 18-35 years. We are planning to further expand the exposure of news component in our selected FM stations," a senior AIR official says.

FM Rainbow is available in 13 cities including Bangalore, Coimbatore, Delhi, Jalandhar, Kodaikanal and Lucknow.