KOLKATA: Viewers in West Bengal will get to see one more Bengali satellite entertainment channel starting today.
Named Orange TV, the new channel will be launched today at 7pm by Kolkata-based production house, T Sarkar Productions. With tie-ups with distributors like SitiCable, KCBPL-GTPL, Manthan, Digicable, AMBC and DEN Networks already in place, Orange TV aims to have a national presence soon and a team of nearly 70 to 75 professionals in the next one year.
“People in West Bengal can see Orange TV from today. We plan to have a national presence sooner,” Orange TV channel coordinator Subhajit Manna told indiantelevision.com. “We started the test signal from 4 March,” he added.
While T Sarkar Productions operates out of Lenin Sarani, the Orange TV studio is located at Tollygunge, better known as Kolkata’s entertainment hub. The channel will cater to the youth by airing a mix of Bengali movies and music and shows related to the Bengali and Hindi film industry. For the next few months, it will air shows at different time slots between 7pm and 10pm.
An anchor-hosted music show titled ‘Orange Ishq’ will be aired at 7pm, followed by ‘Orange Retro’ featuring retro music. For ‘Orange Studio’, the channel has already started getting feeds about the whereabouts of Bollywood from Mumbai-based sources. “The shows will be anchored in Bengali but the music will be in the respective languages,” said Manna. Also in the pipeline are ‘Orange Dhaba’ (cookery show), ‘Orange Blockbuster’ and ‘Orange World Premiere’. The company has produced shows for leading networks including ‘Ei Ghar Ei Sansar’ and ‘Spandan’ for Zee Bangla, ‘Joto Haasi Toto Ranna’ for STAR Jalsha, the ‘Feluda’ series and ‘Arjun’ among others.
According to Manna, Orange TV would be a reflection of contemporary lifestyle and entertainment choices and enjoy a universal appeal among the audience. “The identity of Orange itself is entertainment. Like any other channel that dabbles with fiction, non-fiction, movies and reality shows, we will do that too, with the difference being that we are youth-skewed and more ‘filmi’,” he concluded.
