Rajat Jain is the new executive vice president and business head of Sony Entertainment‘s SET MAX channel.

The channel, launched by SET to focus on movies and cricket, turned two on 8 October. Jain has one been given a one-point agenda by Kunal Dasgupta, CEO of Sony - to oversee the complete revamp of the channel.

Jain, who joined Sony as a key member of its corporate strategy team, hopes over 80 per cent of the revamped channel‘s revenue will come from ad sales, has this to say says, "We will feature only the best and most entertaining films ranging from early favourites to the best blockbusters, in all four slots every day, and not just the evening prime time slot. And, of course, we shall continue to bring viewers the best cricketing action too!"

The new look MAX, which will be launched from November, will also have a special theme for the prime time films on Wednesdays and Thursdays. In November, the channel plans to telecast comedy films every Wednesday, while action films will be shown every Thursday of the month.

MAX is also bringing the whole family together on Sundays, with all-time favourites in the 12.30 pm slot, with films like Bobby, Roop Ki Rani Choron Ka Raja

Nasty! Very nasty! Expect big trouble in the shape of a shrewish hostess with a razor for a tongue as the next big thing on Star Plus after Kaun Banega Crorepati.

The ‘Queen of Mean‘ Mary Robinson - host of the UK version of the Weakest Link .

BBC Worldwide and Star India announced in Mumbai today they had reached a licencing agreement to showcase Weakest Link, the biggest hit to come out of the BBC Worldwide stable in the last ten years (and before that as well?).

The show received a high-powered introduction with BBC Worldwide chief executive Rupert Gavin, Star India CEO Peter Mukerjea and BBC Worldwide director Monisha Shah doing the honours. It was a year ago that BBC Worldwide and Star India first announced their programming alliance with the launch of BBC‘s celebrated Yes Minister in its Hindi avatar Ji Mantriji.

The Indian version of this show will also be in Hindi and will be produced by BBC Worldwide in association with Siddharth Basu‘s Synergy Production‘s. Synergy produces KBC as well, and BBC World‘s mastermind India." The show, to be telecast on Star Plus, will follow the original UK format, including set, graphics and design. Key members from of the UK production team will be involved in the making of this show, it was announced.

The launch of the Hindi Weakest Link comes at a time when the Amitabh Bachchan-hosted KBC has lost much of its sheen and marks a first in that the two shows are being showcased on the same channel. In the UK and the US the two shows fight for the same prime time audience on competing channels. A pity that. It would have been interesting to see how KBC stood up in a straight slugfest.

On the sets of Weakest Link.

And if KBC was known for the Bachchan personna and his catchline "Lock kiya jaaye?", Weakest Link is associated even more closely with its "pitiless presenter" Ann Robinson and the catchline "You are the weakest link. Goodbye." In the space of one year Robinson has gone from relative obscurity as a newspaper columnist to superstar television personality - a superbitch who has taken nastiness to a whole new level. She also happens to be every headline writer worth his salt‘s dream concoction. Two gems among the many headlines used to describe her - "Host from Hell", "Queen of Mean".

On the subject of the Indian host for the show, Mukerjea said no one had been found as yet who could fill the nastiness quotient bill, adding the search was still on. Mukerjea said he hoped to find a suitable host within the next three to four weeks.

Questioned on the prize money at stake, Mukerjea said "no decision has been made, but it will be substantial." Mukerjea confirmed that the catchline for the show had already been decided but was unwilling to elaborate further, saying that once the host had been decided, the telecast date fixed and the prize money determined, an announcement would be made.

Queried on the duration of the show Monisha Shah said that it had a run time of 46 minutes which with the ad breaks meant a one-hour prime time slot.

Mukerjea, while acknowledging the difficulties in finding a suitable host for the show, hinted that if a woman was not found, Star might consider a man hosting the show. If Star does finally opt for a man, it will not be a first. Of the 65 countries where Weakest Link has been licensed, the Irish version has a man - Eamon Dunphy - doing the hardball act.

Now if Star could just find that little old nasty so the that the show can get on the road...!

The Maharashtra government is putting up a commercial teleport and satellite uplinking earth station to uplink TV channels in Film City, the heart of Mumbai filmdom.

The first-of-its-kind teleport, to be set up with an estimated cost of Rs 500 million, will come up within the next two years, according to Film City chairman, Govind Swaroop. The proposed teleport will offer a broad range of telecommunication and broadcast transmission solutions with connectivity via satellite and fibre optics throughout India and the rest of the world with C band and KU band transmission.

Says Swaroop: "The teleport will be a unique facility that can work for the IT as well as the entertainment industries." Broadcasters will not need to approach uplinking stations in Hong Kong or Malaysia if they can get a more cost effective option right in their backyard, he pointed out.

The corporation is also planning to put up high quality video post production facilities, at an estimated cost of Rs 100 to Rs 200 million in the next few years, Swaroop said. The corporation may look at collaborations for these two ventures in the coming days, he said.

The state government-owned Maharashtra Film, Stage and Cultural Development Corporation has now initiated the preliminary exercise of conducting feasibility reports and project planning and layout studies for the mega project. The Corporation currently has 15 state-of-the-art accoustically treated studios and a variety of picturesque locations in Dadasaheb Phalke Chitranagari, more popularly known as Film City.

It already has a sophisticated film processing laboratory and telecine facilities in Film City. A film institute is proposed to be put up in collaboration with filmmaker Subhash Ghai‘s Mukta Arts.