General entertainment channel Sahara TV will be making its presence felt on the Internet in about a month‘s time.

Sahara TV vice-president (publicity, promotions & PR) Priya Raj said that plans had been afoot for a while but had been kept on hold for a variety of reasons. www.saharatv.com is right now going through its beta run on a private ip address, Raj said.

Once approval is given by all parties concerned, the site will start operating. Though details were to be finalised, Raj said the site would be full of interactive features and contests so that the channel can firmly imprint its identity in the mind of the viewer in a cluttered market.

Leading set top manufacturers, including Scientific Atlanta and Motorola, have signed CableLabs‘ POD-Host Interface License Agreement (PHILA) over the last two weeks.
The PHILA is a portion of the CableLabs OpenCable project; companies that sign the accord receive a license to deploy proprietary technology necessary to manufacture OpenCable set tops. CableLabs recently told the Federal Communications Commission that the three companies who have signed the PHILA are Pace Micro Technology PLC, Motorola Broadband Communications sector and Scientific Atlanta.

According to CableLabs, the agreement focuses on the copy protection technology of the connecting point between an OpenCable point-of-deployment (POD) card and the OpenCable set-top box. This interface is the link that allows a retail cable box to be portable across a variety of different cable system headends by standardizing the communication between individual addressable POD modules and the connected set-top terminals or navigation devices.

CableLabs president and CEO Dr Richard Green says : "Having three large consumer electronics manufacturers show their interest in making OpenCable boxes by signing the PHILA validates the cable industry‘s commitment to this advanced digital service provisioning platform."

With the spat between ESPN Star Sports and Hinduja Group MSO InCablenet set to be thrashed out in court, the channel has decided to take its campaign directly to Mumbai‘s viewers.

The print campaign that the channel launched last week was upped a notch today. In areas where the ESPN Star Sports feed is currently not available, leaflets were being distributed along with the Times of India by newspaper vendors.

Headlined "What‘s your problem Dubeyji (referring to the the local cable operator)?", the flier asks the question - "How can you say 80 paise a day is too much?" - (which is what the new monthly subscription rate of Rs 24 for the two channels works out to).

This is an extension of its cheeky new campaign - "It?s My Life" - on TV and print celebrating ESPN Star Sports‘ fifth anniversary in India. The campaign is being handled by ad agency HTA.

A five-year service tax holiday and waiver of customs duty on broadcast uplinking equipment figured prominently in the entertainment industry‘s pre budget pitch to information & broadcasting minister Sushma Swaraj on Monday.
The delegation comprising Ficci, CII and the Indian Broadcasting Foundation (IBF) met Swaraj and made a strong representation on several issues that have dogged the industry. Maintaining that the service tax on broadcasting would fetch the government only Rs 1450 million, the representatives asked Swaraj to seek a five-year tax holiday from finance minister Yashwant Sinha. Swaraj is scheduled to meet Sinha on 16 January with the representations. Delegates of the three organizations were unanimous in seeking removal of customs duty on uplinking, downlinking and cinematographic equipment.

A CII release says the chamber has recommended that the customs duties on content creation software like digital camcorders, digital video and tape recorder, digital video tapes and video monitories, which are between 51 and 63 per cent, should be abolished in five years. CII has said that all recorded CDs should be exempted from excise duty and if not possible, a flat rate of Rs 4-5 should be levied. On the issue of piracy, CII has said that an anti-piracy fund should be set up with contributions to such funds be exempted from income tax.

While at it, the industry has also sought the setting up of a Rs 1000-million fund to enable small and medium newspapers easy access to low interest funds. Co-chairman of the Ficci entertainment committee Amit Khanna has said that the delegation also sought the rationalisation of certain direct taxes, including that pertaining to advance tax on films. Among those who attended Monday‘s meeting were Aaj Tak CEO G Krishnan, Sahara TV‘s Mahesh Prasad, ESPN country head Manu Sawhney, IBF executive director Bhuvan Lal and CII president Sanjiv Goenka.