Sri Adhikari Brothers Television Network Ltd (SABTNL) today announced its financial results for the quarter ended 30 June 2001.

SABTNL, which runs SABe TV and is a a major supplier of software to national broadcaster Doordarshan, posted a 33 per cent decline in net profit to Rs 31.02 million compared to Rs 46.09 million the previous year, an official release states. Operational income however increased 5.2 per cent to Rs 209.26 million from Rs 198.48 million in June 2000.

On the profit front, if money accruing from extraordinary items (income from liquidation of bond investments made by the company) is discounted from the net, the decline is 48 per cent.

A perusal of the company's expenditure indicates that while more money is being pumped into programming ( up to Rs 155.49 million from Rs 128.36 million last year), there have been some staff cutbacks. Staff expenditure is down marginally to Rs 5.65 million from Rs 5.79 million in the corresponding period last year.

An interesting aspect of the results is the amount set aside for depreciation. Up by nearly 50 per cent over last year (Rs 2.92 million from Rs 1.95 million last year). This would appear to indicate that there has either been an investment in fixed assets or some change in accounting practices.

The unaudited results were approved at a board meeting yesterday.

The markets appeared to be unaffected by the results. The SABTNL